The Educational Process

Pre-Primary Education | Basic Education | Secondary Education |

Secondary education

Secondary education is for graduates of basic education. The types of secondary education include: (a) general secondary education, which gives priority to expanding knowledge, developing students’ skills and preparing them to continue their studies at the higher education level; (b) vocational secondary education, which gives priority to expanding specific occupational skills and emphasizes the preparation of students to enter the world of work and expanding their professional attitudes; (c) religious secondary education, which gives priority to the mastery of religious knowledge; and (d) service-related secondary education, which emphasizes the training of service tasks for civil servants or candidates for civil service.

General secondary education is offered in general secondary schools and Islamic senior secondary schools. General secondary education develops the students’ knowledge in accordance with the progress of science, technology and the arts, and enables them to continue their studies at higher levels of education. It also develops the student’s abilities as a member of the community to interact with his/her social, cultural and natural environment.

General secondary education consists of general and specific teaching programmes. The general education programme is implemented in Forms I and II, while the specific teaching programme starts to be implemented in Form III. The new curriculum has been implemented in phases, and was extended to all forms in 1996/97. Quality has been improved by introducing a quarter-year academic cycle (instead of the half-year/semester), and a students’ streaming division (by discipline) in Form III instead of Form II. In addition, planning, assessment of quality, and provision of educational infrastructure and facilities have also been improved. The weekly lesson timetable is shown in the table below:

General senior secondary school: weekly lesson timetable

Vocational secondary education programmes are organized into six different groups of vocational fields, namely: agriculture and forestry; technology and industry; business and management; community welfare; tourism; and arts and handicraft. The national curriculum is adjusted to the local and environmental needs and distinctive features of the vocational education concerned. The curriculum of vocational secondary school consists of general and vocational education programmes.

The general programme consists of a number of compulsory subject matters aiming at moulding the character of students. The general programme consists of Pancasila and civics (two periods per week), religion (two periods per week), Indonesian language and literature (two periods), sports and health education (two periods), and national and general history (two periods per week). To these subjects are added thirty-two periods of specific content, which results in a total of forty-two periods per week. The professional subjects aim at generating a productive ability in the specific field of work.

Between 1968 and 1992, the number of schools increased, with an average of 1,712 new schools every five years. Likewise, an average of 50,761 new teachers were recruited per every five years in the same period.

The enrolment rate in the general and vocational secondary schools is on the increase. The percentage of the 16-18-year-olds at the senior secondary level was 8.58% in 1968 and it reached 35.07% in 1994. The government is constantly expanding and investing in vocational secondary education. In line with the boost of the industrial sector, the number of vocational education students grew from 27.8% in 1988 to 38.86% in 1994. In the same year, the number of male and female students enrolled at the senior secondary school (SSS) level was 54.3% and 45.7%, respectively. The quality of vocational education still needs to be improved, its scope expanded and its programmes matched to the employment needs. At the senior secondary level, the gross enrolment ratio was estimated at 39.3% and the net enrolment ratio at 31.6% in 1999/2000.