T

he government officially suspended the implementation of the much-criticized 2013 national curriculum, ordering schools in the country to return to the 2006 curriculum starting early next year.

Speaking to reporters at the Presidential Palace on Monday, Culture and Elementary and Secondary Education Minister Anies Baswedan confirmed that he had prepared a ministerial decree stipulating the change of curriculum.

'€œ[We] already have the ministerial decree. Insya Allah [God willing], it will be enacted today,'€ he said. '€œWe will start re-implementing the 2006 curriculum in the second semester.'€

The academic year in Indonesia is divided into two semesters, with the first semester starting in July and the second in January.

The 2013 curriculum '€” first implemented by Anies'€™ predecessor, Mohammad Nuh '€” has drawn harsh criticism for creating confusion among students, parents and teachers, who have complained about the extra work it demanded.

Although it imposed many changes in the learning process from the 2006 curriculum, the previous government implemented it after only a one-year trial.

A recent government-sanctioned review of the 2013 curriculum recommended that the ministry scrap the new curriculum and order schools in the country to return to the old one.

The ministry also suggested that the 2013 curriculum needed a tremendous amount of improvement, especially concerning the compatibility of the curriculum'€™s objectives with school textbooks.

Although he admitted that the curriculum overhaul would potentially create chaos in the education system, Anies said that such a move was needed to help parents and students avoid the long-term impacts of educational mismanagement.

'€œ[The curriculum] will continue to be a problem if we do nothing about it,'€ he said. '€œThere will also be more problems if we scrap it, but at least we can cut [the educational] costs since our students will need to pay even higher costs if we stick with this curriculum.'€

Many experts and educators have said that problems related to the 2013 curriculum were rooted in the absence of a thorough review of its feasibility prior to implementation.

Last week Anies said that starting next semester, 6,221 of the country'€™s 208,000 schools would be part of a pilot project to test an improved version of the curriculum and they should get ready for intensive guidance from the ministry.

Teachers at the 6,221 schools, he added, would also receive intensive training since they would be the backbone of the curriculum'€™s implementation.

'€œHowever, if some of the schools aren'€™t ready yet, we will be lenient and they can stick to the 2006 curriculum,'€ Anies said.

Nuh, however, said he was not happy with Anies'€™ move to scrap the curriculum, saying he made the decision '€œtoo soon'€.

'€œIt is like a person who wants to perform amputation surgery but does not have enough knowledge of physiology,'€ he argued.

Former teacher and education expert, Darmaningtyas, supported the government decision to reinstate the 2006 curriculum, saying that although the 2013 curriculum had the noble goal of imparting real-life knowledge to students, it was a total failure in its implementation.

'€œIt just needed more time to do it, while schools only have a limited amount of resources. Also, the student-assessment system that forced teachers to constantly supervise all their students [was a problem],'€ he told The Jakarta Post recently.

The Jakarta Education Agency threw its weight behind the decision, announcing that most schools in Jakarta were not ready to implement the 2013 curriculum.

Education Agency head Lasro Marbun said on Monday that the 2013 curriculum needed evaluation as the decision to implement it had been made hastily. He also said that the infrastructure and resources required for the optimal implementation of the curriculum were not available.