T

he Indonesian Commission on Child Protection (KPAI) called on the Education and Culture Ministry to abolish the national exam.

The Commission also said that the national exam had failed to test the competence of students and instead infringed on the rights of children to develop themselves.

'€œThe national exam, which serves as the only condition for graduation, is an attempt to judge students based on only one standard. By holding the national exam, the government is not giving students the chance to develop their potential,'€ KPAI chairperson Badriyah Fayumi said on Monday.

'€œThe national examination is structural violence against children,'€ she said.

Badriyah said that every teacher and student had different skills and learning capacity.

'€œMany students could barely remember what the exam was about after it finished. That means the exam did not play any role in improving the knowledge or lives of students,'€ Badriyah said.

The KPAI recommended that the best solution would be for the Education and Culture Ministry to allow schools to independently organize final examinations. It said the national exam should only be held to map out the quality of education in the country.

The commission said its proposal, if accepted, could spare students and teachers from stress and anxiety.

'€œThe ministry should stop treating students like objects. They should start to listen to them before implementing policies,'€ Badriyah said.

Rather than a final exam, students need a better quality of education.

'€œBasically, they do not need the national exams. What they need is an even distribution of good quality teachers. With the allocation of 20 percent of the state budget on education, the ministry should have easily achieved that,'€
Badriyah said.

On Monday, a group of students from public and private junior and high schools in Greater Jakarta signed a petition against the national examination at KPAI office.

They urged the government to provide them with good quality teachers rather than focusing on setting a standard for graduation.

'€œTeachers should have received better training before they were assigned to teach us. There are some teachers, who often just hand materials to us without any explanation, which leaves us confused,'€ said Oka, who withheld his real name, a student from public senior high school in Jakarta, during a discussion with the KPAI. He said that sometimes going to school felt like a waste of time.

'€œPrior to the national exam, we received no preparation. A lot of the time we came to school to prepare for the exam, but the teacher failed to show up. It is a waste of our time and energy. How are we expected achieve satisfying results? It is very frustrating,'€ he added.

Responding to the demands, Education and Culture Minister Muhammad Nuh said that he would not drop the national examinations.

Nuh said he could only agree to a proposal that merged the final exam for elementary school and junior high school students.

'€œThere is one proposal saying that as we have a nine year basic education, why do we wait until the third grade of junior high to have the final exam? We are open to suggestions,'€ Nuh said.