Cindy Yunitasari

1506672975

English Assignment Essay Writing

Faculty of Engineering / Class S.301

THE EDUCATION SYSTEM IN INDONESIA AND FINLAND

Education is the essential key of a nations future. It can be used as a map to determine
the future because of being well-educated eases people to get better career path. Finland is a
country claimed to has thebest education system in the world, as it is proven from the result of
Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) test which is a benchmark representing the
student achievement either the first or the second place, beating other students from many
countries. Indonesia, however, is in the 57th place. What makes Finland students perform better
than Indonesian students is the result of its well-designed education system, such as the teaching
method, the school hours, and the teachers.
The first point is teaching method. In Indonesia, it is dominated by one-way
communication method--the teacher is lecturing to an audience of patiently listening and silent
students. It is not that good as it makes students bored and have difficulties to follow the learning
process. Not only that, the students also get plenty of assignments which can reduce their free
time to explore more their unacademic skills, or it can be named work till you drop mentality.
On the other hand, in Finland, teachers implement the learning is fun method by creating the
good atmosphere in the classroom so the students enjoy the learning process. For example, the
teachers let students to do group discussion, give them the motivation and never give them
homework.
The second difference is the school hours. Indonesian students spend a lot of time at
school, or 8 hours a day, from early morning to late afternoon. Additional lesson is still given to
the students, which means that they need to spend some more hours at school. Because they feel
depressed, they do not perform well in their studies. On the contrary, Finland students spend very
short time at school, that is only 5 hours a day.
Final difference is the teachers. In Indonesia, they are not highly respected as some
teachers do not even get good salary. It can be attested that in rural and remote areas, teachers
only earn Rp. 200.000 to Rp. 300.000 per month and that amount is below the regional minimum
wage. However, teaching is more honoured in Finland than becoming doctor or lawyer and is
done professionally. The teachers are selected from the top ten universities in the world and only
ten percent of masters degree best graduates can apply. They also have to undergo various
trainings before they are placed in classrooms. By all these requirements and procedures, the
quality of the Finlands teachers is not necessarily questioned.
The teaching method, the school hours, and the teachersthese are the aspects of what
Finland has revamped in its education system which lead to vast improvement in reading, math
and science literacy over the past decade. Therefore, Finnish education concept can be
considered to be adopted by Indonesia.