Schools may only have been back for a week, but senior high school students are already busy preparing for the year's major goal: enrolling at their preferred universities.

A final-year student at SMA 91 state senior high school, Abiyyu Fakhri, has started to attend learning courses locally known as bimbel or bimbingan belajar starting this week. “I need extra time to study outside school hours so that I can explore the school lessons even further. For me, bimbel is a place where I can ask about school lessons whenever I need to, because my teachers can’t always, or perhaps can only help me during school hours,” said Abiyyu, who hopes to study international relations at the University of Indonesia (UI).

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Meanwhile, a recent graduate of SMA 3 Depok, Rafydah "Rani" Pendar Hatinurani, said that bimbel was a great help to her studies. “Bimbel helps me relearn my lessons from school and if there’s anything that I don’t understand, I can ask about it during the consultation sessions.”

As the national exams and universities' entrance exams consist of multiple choice questions, bimbel students are given lessons, drills and tryouts to familiarize them with the tests. “For 12^th grade students, the main goal is to be accepted at their preferred public university through invitation, state university entrance exams or independent tests at each university,” bimbel coordinator Surkam recently told The Jakarta Post.

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However, not all students choose to study at bimbel. St. Theresia Jakarta High School student Felicia Sugita, for example, said that she preferred private tutors instead. “I don't want to attend bimbel because even if I do, it doesn’t 100 percent guarantee that I will be accepted to a public university,” she said. Felicia, who wishes to study architecture at UI opts to take two or three tutoring sessions per week in mathematics, chemistry and physics. "The schedule of private tutoring sessions is more flexible and I can understand the subjects better than if I study in a crowded bimbel that is similar to being in a school classroom.”

For national-plus school students, the case is quite different. Jaanam Jaswani, for instance, who just graduated from Gandhi Memorial Intercontinental School, revealed that she was engaging neither in bimbel in private classes.

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As she studied at a school that uses the International Baccalaurate (IB) curriculum, Jaanam was freed from the obligation to sit national exams. Thus, instead of familiarizing herself with various kind of test questions, she used her time to learn about options available abroad, choosing a university that suited her aspirations and trying to get accepted into one.

“I'm not considering a local university. To be honest with you, I don’t want to stay here. I've been advised that my career opportunities are limited here. I want to go out there and make it big; I want to work so hard that I don’t have to introduce myself,” said Jaanam, who wishes to major in English and film and is set to enroll at the University of British Columbia in Canada this year. (kes)