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In Australia, Indonesian students fret gov't scholarships
Alma mater: Alma mater: The Advanced Engineering Building at the University of Quensland in Brisbane,Australia, where some Indonesian students are reporting problems receiving their Indonesian government stipends
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Alma mater:: Alma mater: The Advanced Engineering Building at the University of Quensland in Brisbane, Australia, where some Indonesian students are reporting problems receiving their Indonesian government stipends. (Universitas Australia) (Universitas Australia)
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span class="inline inline-left">Alma mater: Alma mater: The Advanced Engineering Building at the University of Quensland in Brisbane,Australia, where some Indonesian students are reporting problems receiving their Indonesian government stipends. (Universitas Australia)
Barry Permana had to find a place to stay for a few days in Jakarta. His hands were laden with luggage as he arrived at Soekarno-Hatta airport from Banda Aceh.
Why he had to report to the Culture and Education Ministry before flying to Melbourne after winning a scholarship from the ministry baffled him.
'I will never forget that I had to come to the Dikti office, just to report my departure,' he said referring to the ministry' Directorate General of Higher Education. 'Their way of getting things done is appalling. I felt really enslaved by this particular ruling.'
Barry, like other Indonesian students quoted in this article, is a pseudonym. Other students have had their scholarships terminated after airing grievances on Facebook.
'The first year I was at uni, it was OK,' Barry continued. 'But my scholarship fee from Dikti failed to come on time for my second year and when it did come it was a lesser amount. This forced me to look for casual work and to borrow money from friends,' Barry said.
Barry said he also had to convince the university that Dikti was late in disbursing his scholarship.
'The university is willing to allow late payment provided they can have communication access with Dikti or at least if Dikti would have replied to my repeated emails, which was not the case,' Barry said.
There are currently some 1,300 students with Dikti scholarships out of an estimated 36,000 Indonesians studying overseas.
'I have heard about the difficulties facing some Indonesian students, but I don't think it is a widespread phenomenon,' says Krishna Sen, a noted scholar of Indonesian cinema and communications and the dean of the Faculty of Arts at the University of Western Australia in Perth.
'There must be a reason why some of those students have failed to pay their tuition fees on time,' she told The Jakarta Post.
According to Dikti, the directorate did not pay the scholarships because overseas student supervisors failed to send progress reports on time, while the students said supervisors had never failed to send the reports.
Kevin, a doctoral student from China at the University of Queensland, said that his government scholarship was deposited into his account every three months.
'Before they transfer the money, I need to write a brief report to update my PhD progress. If you do it in time, my scholarship will always arrive on time. Sometimes I forget to write the report, but I can send it at a later date and my scholarship will come the next month,' he said.
Chinese students do not have to deal with supervisors or administration staff, Kevin said, adding that the university's scholarship was almost the same as his stipend. 'So we don't have to find a job to pay for our living cost.'
On part-time work, Sen said it was not uncommon for Australian students to find jobs. 'Tuition fees are very high in Australia, even for Australian students,' she said.
Devi, a student at Curtin University in Perth, said that Dikti payments could be as much as three months' late, which led her to borrow money from her sponsor university in Indonesia.
'I would prefer to have a few well-managed scholarship programs rather than the many programs available,' she said referring to Beasiswa Unggulan, Bermutu, Bidik Misi and BLN Dikti, among several other progamss.
Another student, Wira from Queensland University of Technology in Brisbane, said that Dikti should increase its stipend and expand coverage for doctoral students.
'Countries on par with Indonesia, like Iraq, Iran and Malaysia, offer better scholarships for their students. Their living cost allowances are higher and their study period is a solid four years,' Wira said.
Dikti typically provides annual scholarships of A$21,000 (US$18.742) in a country where an annual income of A$30,000 is considered poor.
Wira also lamented the administration work imposed by Dikti scholarship recipients. 'It costs us a lot of time and money,' he said, 'It disturbs our studies.'
Wira described the hurdles to extend his stipend from three to four years. 'We never know when the approval will come. This put us in a terrible mood of uncertainty.'
Rhoma, a doctoral candidate at Curtin University in Perth, described what happened when Dikti was late with his stipend. 'When it happens, there will always be a warning from the fee center and an occasional threat of student visa revocation.'
'I am proud to be a recipient of a a Dikti scholarship since I am not saddled by a donor's mission to do something that could be harmful to Indonesia,' Rhoma said. 'The late arrival of scholarship fee from Dikti has actually spurts my spirit of hard work, because without a job I would not be able to support myself.'
The silver lining is Indonesian students tend to bond closer because of their common problem.
'Our affection for our motherland can only increase,' he said.
