Heaptalk, Jakarta – To face the changing of technology, social, and the environment globally, Indonesian talents must have a global competence and attitude aligned with the value of Pancasila – as stated in the Pancasila Student profile.
Depart from that, the Ministry of Education and Culture (Kemendikbud) and The Educational Fund Management Institutions (LPDP) have been collaborating to expand the scope and the target for every program performed by LPDP.
“The collaboration of Kemendikbud and LPDP will be strengthening each other vision, following the President’s instruction to reach leading talents. Along with master and doctorate that has been successfully performed, we will create leaner process selection, then added with Kampus Merdeka programs for students, scholarship and internship program for lecturer, scholarship for teacher, scholarship for students, teacher, and lecturer at vocational level, scholarship for senior high school students, and scholarship for those in the cultural industry,” The Minister of Education and Culture (Kemendikbud), Nadiem Anwar Makarim explained during the launch of Merdeka Belajar Episode 10: Expansion of the Education Fund Management Institution (LPDP) Scholarship Program, in Jakarta, Thursday (22/4).
“So, it is not only adding the program options, but we also expand the target to the teacher, education staff, and those in the cultural industry that become the spearhead to promote and prosper the people of Indonesia, especially for globally leveraged,” he continued.
further information about the scholarship; lpdp.kemenkeu.go.id
The Minister of Finance (Kemenkeu), at the same time, also supports the programs initiated by the Kemendikbud and Minister of Religion (Kemenag) to build quality Indonesian talents. The Minister of Finance, Sri Mulyani, stated that this Merdeka Belajar 10 was an excellent collaboration between Kemendikud and Kemenkeu as the Public Service Agency (BLU) superintendent endowment fund – specifically in education.
“the effectivity of education expenditure depends on the quality of its programs,” underlines Minister of Finance, Sri Mulyani.
The education endowment fund is used to sponsor the scholarship, both regular, affirmation, and ASN/TNI/Polri. Menkeu stated that the endowment fund policy arises from the rationale to provide a useful fund between generations.
“We hope Kemendikbud and Kemenag think about the design of the funding allotment that the related institutions can utilize as wise as possible and not hastened to spend out in one-year funding,” she stated.
“LPDP has allocated the endowment fund by Rp70.1 trillion. There was an endowment fund up by Rp61.1 trillion from the total amount, an endowment fund for research by Rp4.99 trillion, an endowment fund for university by Rp3 trillion, and an endowment fund for culture by Rp1 trillion,” stated the Minister for Finance.
Kemenkeu, through the BLU, expects that the usage from the investment of this endowment fund can give flexible and practical support for every program designed by Kemendikbud, Kemenag, and other ministries that responsible for education and research fields.
Relate to the expanded scope of the LPDP achievement, Sri Mulyani states her supports and emphasizes Kemenkeu focus: to support the most demanded program by the students, maintain good governance, and convince that this spending gives the best impact.
“Monitoring and evaluation become essential on this, and we encourage the supervision of the LPDP funding that is careful and responsible – considering this endowment fund purposed to serve across generation and to be utilized by the future generations of Indonesia,” Sri Mulyani said.
Kemendikbud keeps committed to cope with the discrepancy of the education quality interzonal that needs to overcome. Mendikbud further expressed that the discrepancy happens because of the lack of the distributions of education that considers inequitable in some regions, including teacher’s competence.
Previously, there were some collaborative programs between Kemendikbud and LPDP, which are affirmation scholarship, targeted scholarship, and general scholarship. This year, both parties have cooperated carrying a series of new programs such as Kampus Merdeka, a program for lecturer and the education staff, a program for teacher and its education staff, a vocational program, a success program, and a cultural scholarship.
The Minister of Education and Culture conveyed that the policy of the LPDP scholarship program currently available is re-arranged so that the selection process becomes more direct.
“Some of the new policy direction in 2021 programs are making the scholarship beneficiaries can employ on their degree (bachelor, master, and doctorate), and non-degree program – with the quality based on the predefined criteria,” explained the Minister.
The president director of LPDP, Andin Hadiyanto, expects this expanded program every single penny resulted can be useful for many people. He assumes that this program is a commitment from his party, LPDP, to be relished by the wider community and become more inclusively for them. It aligns with the efforts in carrying out the Nawacita program from the President of the Republic of Indonesia, Joko Widodo, related to the development of leading and advanced human resources.
“We will constantly collaborate so that there will be more optimization in funding that other Ministry and related institutions can utilize,” said Andin Hadiyanto.
LPDP supports four Kampus Merdeka programs in 2021; Kampus Mengajar, Internship and Certified Independent Studies (Microcredentials), Indonesia International Student Mobility Awards (IISMA), and Merdeka Student Exchange. “We will start this program on August/September 2021,” Nadiem explained.
On the Kampus Mengajar, Kemendikbud invites students to become agents of change by teaching in selected Junior High schools. They help literacy and numeration studies for JHS students in one semester to escalate the Programme For International Student Assessment (PISA) score.
For the Internship and Certified Independent Studies (Microcredentials), the living and the semester credits cost are given for students who have been successfully approved for internship in a worldwide organization that Kemendikbud acknowledges for one to two semesters. The students will be involved in solving real problems/issues, receiving full-time guidance, and being immersed and accompanied by industry certificates. “Kemendikbud sponsors the living cost during the internship,” he continued.
The Indonesian International Student Mobilscholarship ity Awards (IISMA) is given for a bachelor’s degree student who studies for one to two years in a selected university abroad. Students can select some activities. For one semester, such as student exchanges with a total of ten to twenty credit units, visiting student programs for one semester containing ten to twenty credit units, or short courses below one semester with various credit units.
Another program from the Kampus Merdeka supported by LPDP is the Merdeka student exchange. This program gives scholarship for students that belongs to the student exchange program to universities abroad for one semester. The purpose is to introduce and know other nation culture for expanding and strengthening our students’ academic competencies.
The LPDP also involve in developing programs addressed for lecturers and the education staff. It includes the regular scholarship for the lecturer (master and doctorate), scientific research, and internship program both in the industry and university. Besides that, a program also appealed to teachers and the education staff; master scholarships for those studying domestic or abroad, teacher certification (micro-credentials), and doctorate scholarship for a teacher who wants to continue their study.
The vocational program is also expanded, including an internship in the industry for vocational high school teacher; bachelor scholarship for the teacher, field practice for the students, scholarships for lecturer outside their campus, certification, internship, and training for lecturer and the education staff, master and doctorate scholarship both domestic and abroad, and supporting the research and their scientific paper for the lecturer.
There is a program offered for outstanding students; a full scholarship for a bachelor’s degree. The scholarship is also intended for the non-achievers students that are accepted in a world-class university abroad.
For the first time, this program also gives the scholarship for those in the cultural industry and the homeland arts — the bachelor scholarship for domestic culture, master scholarship for cultural studies both domestic and abroad. (FK)
