Jakarta (Koran Tempo: 28/06/06) The government needs to review its decision not to hold a remedial examination for students who failed in the national examination. Failing students are still given a chance to join an equivalency Packet C program which allows them to obtain a high school – equivalency diploma to enroll in universities.

This option will replace the remedial test for the national examination. However, there are still many hassles to this solution. The government should speed up the Packet C equivalency exam for students failing to graduate to allow them to enroll to universities before the registration period is closed.

The Ministry of Education has done the right thing by speeding up the examination from November to August this year. However, many problems have been waiting: many universities refuse to recognize this equivalency certificate. Not all campuses allow students holding this certificate to enter their regular programs.

Their reason is quite acceptable. Until now, those holding Packet C, join the extension programs organized by the universities, especially because most of the students holding the Packet C certificate are already working. Again, National Education Minister Bambang Sudibyo have to send letters to all universities’ directors to instruct them  to recognize this equivalency certificate. Moreover, there is not much different in the subjects tested.

However, there is still another requirement to join this program: participants of Packet C have to take a 3-month course before taking the equivalency examination! We are unsure that this is interesting for hundreds of students failing to graduate – many of whom are now busy complaining elsewhere.

Therefore, there is nothing wrong to hold a remedial examination for students who failed in the national examination. However, in the long run, we should review the national examination policy. The government insisted to administer the national project which worth hundred of billions of Rupiah in an effort to improve education quality.

Those who are against it said that the national examination is a form of the government’s intervention in teachers’ authority. They argue that the according to the Law no. 20 / 2003 on National Education System, those who have the rights to evaluate students’ performance are teachers, and not the government.

The national examination is seen as something scary because students‘achievement during their three-years schooling the guidance of their teachers could be swept away by an education that last for several hours.
The National examination is just one among several means to evaluate students’ quality, and it should not be the only one that determines students’ graduation.

Students is not the only one hat determine the education quality, but also the school quality (facilities, infrastructure, and teachers), regional condition, and the average quality of the population in the region.
Education budget is far more important. Without any adequate budget, it is not easy to improve education quality in the country.

Many regions prefer building public infrastructure and increasing civil servant salary to education. Not to mention… disparities among regions, especially between Java and outside Java. National examination has overlooked all those problems; and the most worrying: the national exam has been used as a mean of the government to judge students who failed to graduate.