“Exclusivity” of State Universities and Study Programs

In the midst of the dismay over the arrest of the chancellor and several board leaders of the University of Lampung, two concerns have emerged.

The first issue is related to the demands for improved governance, especially in the self-managed admission of new students. The second is the urgency for university leadership quality and integrity. These were raised by Didi Achjari and Satrio Soemantri Brodjonegoro in their articles in Kompas (24/8/2022). The two columns seem to resonate with the annoyance, anxiousness and disappointment of the Education, Culture, Research, and Technology Minister Nadiem Makarim and acting Higher Education Director General Nizam, over the suspects’ alleged case of taking kickbacks.

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Their exasperation is understandable given that the ministry has been striving to improve the quality of higher education and encourage universities to increase their international competitiveness with a view to having them placed respectably in the world rankings. The arrests appear to be pulling the movement back to the very starting point. With their honorable status as university leaders and most respected academic titles, they are found to have distanced themselves from the academic idealism to produce graduates who uphold integrity, honesty, commitment to services discipline and nationalism. With all the privilege and facilities provided by the state, including funding, they seem to always be finding shortcomings and making them a pretext to act fraudulently.

And the second, what is the relevance and implication of the self-managed admission at state universities to the role and existence of private universities?

While we are in agreement to leave the case to the realm of the law and the heightened guard that such an incident will not happen again — be it through an evaluation of self-managed university student admissions or a more stringent selection of university leaders — there are two issues that deserve attention. The first is which aspect, or precisely what study program, is vulnerable to bribery practices in student admissions? And the second, what is the relevance and implication of the self-managed admission at state universities to the role and existence of private universities?

Medical schools

Is it likely for prospective students (parents) to give away hundreds of millions of rupiah as compensation for a seat in study programs such as, say, Javanese literature, philosophy, teacher training and education, economics, law, socio-political sciences or communication? What about engineering study programs, visual communication design (DKV), pharmacy, agriculture, animal husbandry, industrial engineering or informatics?

The answer to the above question over possible money involvement in enrolling for those study programs is "probably", and the degree of "probability" will indicate the degree of "oddity" that may prevail in society. In this context, the degree or extent of exclusivity of a study program is decisive.

Exclusivity, which invokes connotations of “limited” or “elite”, relates to policymaking, public perception, as well as objectivity. From the perspective of policy, the regulations or institutions have created exclusivity of certain study programs, as if labelling those academic disciplines as limited edition. The message is that not everyone can afford and be part of that study program.

To deal with this, a set of terms and conditions were drawn up. An institution separated from the education ministry was also established to guard and supervise it.

Perceptually, the exclusivity of a study program emerges out of public perception or judgment. Their perception may have been built upon media narratives or influence by people around them, including that supervisory institution. Exclusivity can be objective, with substantiation based on certain qualifications, criteria and qualities. While being open to public perception, it has a criteria that is strict, measurable and real.

In addition to being motivated to study hard in order to pass the university entrance exam, prospective students may also be tempted to seek connections or prepare kickbacks if accepted (while the results of their admissions exam was a fail).

In admitting new students, each study program at a university has its own “exclusivity”. In this case, the psychology of marketing applies. The first assumption is, "the more a candidate wants to get into a particular study program or major, the greater the temptation for the candidate to take any means to get in and be accepted." In addition to being motivated to study hard in order to pass the university entrance exam, prospective students may also be tempted to seek connections or prepare kickbacks if accepted (while the results of their admissions exam was a fail).

This is followed by the second assumption that, “the more the prospective students are interested in a particular study program, while the intake capacity (quota) of the study program is limited, the greater the temptation to commit fraud”. As an illustration, on the website of the university entrance exam-organizing Higher Education Entrance Test Institute (LTPTM), it is stated that for 2022 the capacity for medical education at the University of Lampung through the national selection for state university entrance (SNMPTN) and national joint entrance test for state university (SBNPTN) was only 59 and 125, respectively, for which 1,449 and 2,356 students applied.

The capacity quota for jalur mandiri (self-managed admission) was higher than that (the maximum quota is 50 percent), which might be contested by 20-30 times the number of applicants than through the two regular admission procedures. This illustrates a tight competition that also testifies to exclusivity. The illustration is in line with survey reports and reports from various national media. The study programs that are high in demand from year to year are schools of medicine, dentistry, public health and pharmacy.

For the fields of technology and science, those expected to attract many prospective students are information systems, data science and computers, while law, accounting, communication and psychology are highly popular in the social and humanities fields.

In short, exclusivity, or favorability of study programs comes in proportionality to the hard work, or the probability of cheating along with sums of money that may have to be incurred to get a place. The fact that there are no more than 100 medical schools in more than 4,000 universities across Indonesia evidently makes medicine an exclusive study program.

Implications

The phenomenon of this exclusivity is also shown by the "oddity" that practices of bribery to attend state universities may be rife, while at the same time a number of private universities face difficulties in recruiting students. This is equivalent to the fact that hundreds of thousands of senior high schools (SMA) and vocational schools (SMK) graduates compete to enter state universities, either through the academic achievement-based SMNPTN (indicated on performance document), competency-bases SBNPTN (in written test), or the “economic” affordability (in mandiri admission), while hundreds of private universities lurk in their perch in wait for new students.

This fact does not rule out the existence of private universities with their own exclusivity-labelled study programs. Aspects of policy, perception and objectivity simultaneously or separately also influence this exclusivity. And because of its exclusivity in nature, fraudulent practices or violations of ethics are presumably there in the process of admitting new students.

However, the notion of cheating and unethicalness tends to be overweighed by the logic of marketing and particularity of private universities. In other words, the exclusivity of a private university and the offered study programs lean toward social reality, public perception and objective conditions. That is a fair exclusivity, at least according to market references, because what happens is a transaction based on economic rationality.

What should be avoided is fraud about the status and accreditation rating of the study program or university itself.

In addition, the particularity of private universities gives them the authority and autonomy to carry out student admissions independently. What should be avoided is fraud about the status and accreditation rating of the study program or university itself.

It is also the market principle that requires leaders and patrons of private universities to think hard, be creative and innovative to develop the educational institutions and their study programs to be “exclusive” (preferable), sell well in the market, create a good public perception and have proven quality.

However, no matter how hard private universities try, they cannot take the gloss of exclusivity and privileges from state universities. And indeed, private universities were not founded to do that. The most rational and realistic thing to do to balance the image is to build on their own perceptual and objective exclusivity. Not a few private universities are successful in this regard.

The exclusivity of state universities is attained through efforts that can build good perception among the public. That's part of the rights and freedom for the community to judge. That people still prioritize being able to study at state universities, regardless of their accreditation status and ranking or that they turn out to be more expensive than private universities, is pertaining to the social reality. On a positive note, it indicates public sentiment and nationalism, as long as it is not twisted to conflict of interests and orientations (between groups and ideologies).

What is our concern is the exclusivity inside state universities, which is born out of government regulations and public institutions, because it is here that private universities feel the nuances of discrimination and marginalization by regulatory institutions. Policies that facilitate state universities to accept the bulk of senior high school graduates, including their presence in several regencies and municipalities, have implications for the shrinking space for private universities to get new students.

The accusation that state universities are “dredging” student pools has arisen from suspicions that the “dredge” appears to be a drawback of the government’s push to enter the world university rankings (WRU). Another example is the privilege of state universities to open new study programs, while private universities have to go through bureaucratic and lengthy processes to obtain a permit.

The moratorium policy on opening new study programs that is still being enforced by the education ministry clearly discriminates against the creativity of private universities when it comes to diversifying their study programs that are not only based on the vision and mission, aligning with the spirit of Kampus Merdeka (freedom campus) policy, but also on the logic of the prospective market.

The policy, which tends to exclude (read: marginalize) private universities, is actually not in line with the spirit of the Higher Education Law No. 12/2012, such as Article 6 which states, “Higher education is held with the principles of: (a) the search for scientific truth by the academic community; (b) democracy, justice and non-discrimination by upholding human rights, religious values, cultural values, pluralism, national diversity and unity”.

With these principles, both state and private universities carry the same mandate as moral guardians and the development of human civilization, apart from contextual matters that seek to improve the welfare of the nation.

Regarding student admissions, there are several provisions that must be complied with, including Article 73: "Universities maintain a balance between the maximum number of students in each study program and the capacity of facilities and infrastructure, lecturers and education staff, as well as services and other educational resources". It is also stated that "The admission of new students is an academic selection and is prohibited from being associated with commercial purposes".

Making Indonesian universities more inclusive remains the homework. In order for the gross enrollment rate (GER) to increase, from only 34 students, who can continue to higher education, out of every 100 SMA/SMK graduates, an impartial policy is needed for state and private universities. Although state universities seem to still enjoy the privilege of exclusivity both because of policies and public perception, state and private universities should develop an exclusivity that is based more on objective quality. That private universities expect exclusivity based on public policies and perceptions is something that is also natural.

KOMPAS/TATANG MULYANA SINAGA

Mangadar Situmorang.

Mangadar Situmorang, Chancellor of Parahyangan Catholic University

(This article was translated by Musthofid).