The Strategic Role of Vocational School

There are at least four strategic roles that vocational schools play:

1. Vocational school is an integral part of the economic sectors that drive the national economic growth.

2. Vocational school improves the qulity of Indonesian labor force which in turn will enhance the competitive advantages of Indonesia’s economy.

3. Vocational school has proved to reduce unemployment rate in Indonesia.

4. Vocational school will support the development of businesses and industries in Indonesia.

Why Choosing Vocational Schools?

1. With equal educational quality, vocational schools may become the first choice among junior high school students.

2. Vocational schools will provide students with skills and competency enabling them to directly enter the job market.

3. Vocational schools have continuous partnership programs with businesses and industries that help the implementation of the link and match program.

4. Vocational school graduates have the opportunity to continue their education to higher tertiary education such as university.

5. Vocational school is the solution for solution for reducing unemployment rate and supporting economic development.

Vision, Mission, Goals and Targets of The Directorate of Technical and Vocational Education

VISION

To have vocational education institution which produce world qualified individual and expand the educational service based on local performance.

MISSION

- Improve the professionalism and accountability the Vocational Education Institution as an International Standard Competency Center.

- Implement the vocational education system with permeable and flexible method which is integrated between the level and phase of education.

- Extended and broaden the education access which is based on qulity and local performance.

- Improve the social involvement to running the vocational education.

- Develop the capacity Building of the vocational education management by having synchronization and coordination.

GOALS

- Develop Accountable Vocational Education Institution as an International Standard Competency Centre.

- To educate Human Resource which is have work ethos and International Standard Competency.

- To provide Vocational Education services with Permeable and Flexible method and integrated between the level and phase of education.

- To extend and broaden the vocational education access.

- To bring the local content as the national competitiveness capital.

- To ensure the educational process is suitable the social need.

- To utilise the social resources for educational process

- To optimise the educational resources to improve the service and the access of the vocational education.

TARGET

- All Teacher having competancy certificat and every 2-3 years attending the development training.

- 200 International Standard of SMK spread out in 40% of Kab/Kota.

- 1000 National Standard of Technical and Vocational School.

- 5000 foreign student.

- Number of student attending Industrial Practical Program in overseas 15.000/year.

- 60 of Technical and Vocational School having Joint Program with overseas institution.

- 5 Student win gold medals in WSC.

- Improve the new student capacity up to 1,75 million/year.

- Functioning 450 SMK as Community Center/CC (1 CC per kab/kota 100 CC as an embryo of Polytechnic), which also performed as an ICT Centre.

- 30 Technical and Vocational School running the Multy Entry – Multy Exit based on seamless Education.

- 6 PPPG became the “net” and 54 LSP function as Quality Assurance Institution.

- Having 30 Workstation

- 400 Technical and Vocational School as Testing Centre.

- 150.000 students have an International Certificate and 1.500.000 National Certificate.

- 75.000 becoming entrepreneurs.

- 1.000 SMK as a model of the community Development.

- Optimised the MPKN, MPKP and MPKD.

- Improve the new student capacity between 25-100 % through optimization the existing educational resources.

The Permeable and Flexible System

What does Permeable and Flexible Training System mean?

Permeable means each one educational unit or system can penetrate into the others. For examples, vocational school students may improve their academic capability by having a bridging course in a senior high school; on the other hand, senior high school students may have a bridging training in a certain major in vocational school.

Flexible means students may start and finish their training program at any time, especially those taking up multy entry-exit skill programs.

Growth Target: The Number of Vocational Schools, Students and Teachers

Component	2005-2006	2006-2007	2007-2008	2008-2009	2009-2010
Number of students	2,1 Millions	2,4 Millions	2,9 Millions	3,5 Millions	4,3 Millions
Number of Teachers	94 Thousands	110 Thousands	138 Thousands	174 Thousands	216 Thousands
Number of Vocational Schools	6 Thousands	6,15 Thousands	6,3 Thousands	6,5 Thousands	6,6 Thousands

Ratio of Senior High School : Vocational School

Ratio of Senior High School : Vocational School

Year	Technical and Vocational School	Senior High School
2005-2006	35	65
2006-2007	37	63
2007-2008	38	62
2008-2009	43	57
2009-2010	50	50

The Importance of Skilled Workers

1. Skilled workers are directly involved in producing goods and services; they play a significant role in determining the quality level of the goods produced or the services rendered, and also the production cost.

2. Skilled workers are needed to support the growth of industries in a country.

3. As global competition has been fiercer day by day, skilled workers become the key success factor in facing the global competition.

4. The advancement of technology depends on skilled workers to master and apply.

5. Besides having a better opportunity for employment, skilled workers are also productive; the more skilled workers a nation has, the better and strong the economy.

6. Similarly, higher unemployment rate will occur if a nation lacks of skilled workers.

Vocational School Graduates Comparison

The benefit and advantages of technical and vocational education can be seen when comparing vocational school geaduates with senior high school graduates, in the following table:

Technical and Vocational School	Senior High School
Obtain a focussed competency	Requires further coaching to have a skill
More skilled in laboratory or practice during tertiary education	Requires adjustment
With various skills, the unemployment rate among vocational school graduates is low	Unemployment rate is higher, as senior high school graduates often do not meet the required qualifications
Graduates are more prepared for employment	Graduates are prepared for tertiary university education
The education method in vocational school focuses on life skills	The education method is still global; not yet focused on skills

Improvement of SMK

The Ministry of National Education has set up Three Main Goals for 2004-2009:
(1) To spread and widen the access for education;
(2) To improve Quality, Relevance and Competitiveness and
(3) To strengthen Management, Accountability and Public Image.

Along with the above goals, Directorate for Vocational School which is under the Directorate General for Manajement of Primary and Secondary Education has set up several main targets in bringing up vocational schools capable of dealing with the competitive global era.

Spreading and widening the access for education;
a. Improving vocational school’s capacity by establishing new schools, setting up smaller vocational school within the secondary school or other institution, setting up distance learning model of vocational school in Pondok Pesantren (the school for Koranic studies), Senior High School and within an industry, as well as empowering existing vocational schools, both state-owned and private.
b. Offering special vocational school programs in under-developed areas or at the nation’s borders.
c. Setting up a scholarship scheme for the rather unfortunate students and improving the infrastructure.

Improving Quality, Relevance and Competitiveness
a. Providing support facilities: library, laboratory or workshop.
b. Enhancing partnership with business or industry, and, in cooperation with industry, developing a model vocational school.
c. Developing Information Technology program that includes ICT (Information and Communication Technology) Center as well as computer labs and internet access.
d. Setting up vocational schools with local and international standard, partnering with overseas education institutions for internship program.
e. Improving reference books, textbooks and reading materials.
f. Improving the average score in National Examination, including the improvement of beasic skills, Increasing the frequency of examination, and arranging online examination.
g. Developing a competency-based curriculum which includes imposing Competency Certification, both at local and international standard.


Strengthening Management, Accountability and Public Image.
a. Capacity-building programs at all level of organizations, starting with the Directorate for Vocational School, school management and all stakeholders of vocational school.
b. Socializing the policy of the Directorate for Vocational School towards society, business/industry and international bodies.
c. School mapping program accompanied by a need analysis of what the business/industry requires.
d. Improving Quality Management System, starting with monitoring and evaluation, implementing the e-government, analyzing vocational education development, ISO 9001:2000 requirement, and developing Central Vocational Schools at the national, provincial and regency levels.

Technical and Vocational Education Goal

Government Regulation No. 19/2005 on the standard of national education, elaborately defines the goals of technical and vocational education: “Secondary vocational education prioritizes preparing students for employment and developing professionalism”.

Referring to the Letter of Regulation of the Ministry of Education and Culture No. 04907 U/1990, the goals of vocational education can be described as follows:

1. Preparing student for higher education level or to expand their primary education.
2. Improving students ability, as the member of society, to maintain a mutually beneficial relationship with their social ad cultural environment.
3. Improving student capability for self development in sciences, technology and art, also
4. Preparing students for employment and to develop professionalism.

Vocational School

The existence of vocational school in Indonesia dates back to the era before the country’s independence. Dedi Supriadi (2002) noted that “Sekolah Pertukangan” (a school for craftsman), established in Surabaya in 1853, could be the first vocational school in Indonesia. From the colonial era until today, vocational school in Indonesia has had a dynamic history.

During the early days of independence and up to the first Five-year Development Plan era, the problem lay mostly in providing infrastructure and facility. Later on it was the quality issues, and nowadays it’s about shifting from the “supply-driven” paradigm into a “demand-driven” approach, and the link and match system as well as the “Pendidikan Sistem Ganda” or commonly known as internship or apprenticeship program.

Referring to the Law No. 20 on National Education System in 2003, Technical and Vocational Education is defined as “an education to prepare students to be able to work in certain fields”. More specifically, the Government Regulation No. 19/2005 on National Education Standard, stated the target in secondary education: the technical and vocational education aims to develop students skill and capability for a certain job. Hence, technical and vocational eduication needs to have a close relationship with the business or industry.

The Benefits of Vocational Education

1. For student

• Improvement of personal quality
• Earning a better income
• Ready for further or higher education
• Ready to contribute to the society and the nation

2. For the business or industry

• Getting skilled, quality workers
• Reduce company’s expenditure
• Support the progress of businee itself

3. For Society

• Improve social welfare
• Enhance national pruductivity and improve national income
• Reduce unemployment rate

Vocational Education

Vocational Education is one of the sub systems in our National Education System. Generally, vocational education (Wardiman, 1998) has the following characteristics:

1. It is intended to prepare students for the job market.
2. It is based on a “demand-driven” approach (what the business or industry needs).
3. It is focused on mastering the knowledge, skill, attitudes and values needed in the work environment.
4. The true benchmark for students or graduates success is the performance in their job.
5. The key success of vocational education is a strong relationship with the business or industry.
6. It shall be responsive to anticipate the advancement of technology.
7. It shall focus on “learning-by-doing” and hands-on-experience” principles.
8. It requires up-to-date facilities for practice.
9. It requires higher investment and operational costs compared to that of a general secondary education.

The Keyword: Education

Countries with the potentials to move forward, leaving others to win the competition in this globalization era, have at least one thing in common: they focus on education, continuously improving the quality opf their education system, as well as the accessibility. Indonesia has realized the importance of education as the foundation to build competitive advantages; but it reality, from the state budget point of view, a pro-education budget has only begun in 2004 when the education sector was allocated 20% of the total budget.

Indonesia needs to seriously develop reliable, competitive human resources in this globalization era, to ensure a sustainable growth in development. We already know that the key is in quality education. The question now would be what type of education system to build.

Local Autonomy

Another issue we need to pay attention to is the implementation of local autonomy policy, which dictates the need for technical and managerial capability throughout the archipelago. Besides, privatization and the fact that government continues to minimize its role in the economic activities have already been a trend not only in Indonesia but also elsewhere in the world. It means that everyone has to be responsible for their own future. Simply put, we need to make it on our own, utilizing the most of our skills and ability.

The Facts

What is the real condition of our labor force? Unfortunately, most of the Indonesian workers (76 millions), fall into unskilled worker category, while only 19 millions quality as skilled workers; and 4,5 millions as expert workers.

There’s another worrying fact: the unemployment rate shows no sign of decreasing. Data from the Central Bureau of Statistics revealed that in 2004, the unemployment rate came close to 10% of the total labor force, amounting to 9,13 millions. In other words, one out of ten in the labor force is jobless or looking for job. However, there’s also an interesting detail in the unemployment figures; the unemployment rate is much higher more than twice –in high school graduates compared to vocational school graduates.

The Competency

All countries are in the race to prepare the most suitable human resources for this competition era. Indonesia itself has underlined the core competency required in this global era:

1. basic ability enabling self improvement to adapt to the development in science and technology;
2. the ability to collect, analyze and organize information;
3. the ability to communicate ideas and information;
4. the ability to plan and organize activities;
5. the ability to cooperate and work in group;
6. problem solving ability;
7. the ability in logical thinking and to utilize mathematical ideas and techniques;
8. the ability to communicate in English.

The New Economy

In recents years, Indonesia has started its effort to shift from being an agricultural country to the one focusing on industrial and services sectors. Since a decade ago, the contribution of induistrial, manufacturing and services sectors has far exceeded that of the agricultural sector. This means there will be more job opportunities in the industrial and services sectors. At the same time, the world economies show a flexible character; it changes dynamically as countries are becoming interdependent to each other. Globalization is not anymore something that will occure in distant future; it is already a reality, today. And globalization needs multi-skilled, flexible, true-learner human resources with entrepreneurial skills.

It is already known that the main capital of a country is its human resources. Countries with high competitive level usually have quality human resources. The top three countries in The Global competitiveness Report 2006-2007, Switzerland, Finland and Sweden, are good examples to show how skilled work forces with entrepreneurial flair, contribute to the success of the country.

A Competitive World

Now, why the world, and our life, drastically change? One good reason to point out: globalization. It brings on more opportunities, but on the other hand, as if being a two-sided coin, it brings on the competition. A borderless world has materialized, and created the opportunity for everyone to live, work and transact anywhere, anytime. Within such a competitive environment, countries with the more prepared human resources will attract more companies to invest into. Needless to say, the keyword here is the quality of human resources.

The World is Changing ... !

Do you realize that we are now witnessing a dramatically changing world? The level competition is getting fiercer. We have to fight our way for a seat in favourite university. Yet after graduating from recognised university, getting a job is not as easy as one may think. We need to defeat hundreds of other candidates. Moreover, having a decent job often is no guarantee that your take-home pay is enough to cover your monthly expenses. The old story of our parents dreaming that their children would be good students, got good marks at schools, graduated, got good job and live happily ever after, may be no longer true. We need to get back to reality, that the world is indeed changing. This is the competition era!