For the Dignity of Farmers’ Children
Pasawahan village residents mostly work as farmhands. They think it is unnecessary to get a good education in order to become farm workers. Not only is it a waste of time, it also needs funding.
Sometime in 2004, Yayat Hayatul Hasani, 35, went to Pasawahan village, Banjaranyar, Ciamis regency, West Java, to educate farmers and to focus on farmers’ children who did not attend school.
One morning, Opet—as Yayat Hayatul Hasani is nicknamed—was going to make a village tour. On his way, he came across a group of children heading for rice fields with hoes on their shoulders. It was far from what Opet had imagined. In his imagination, he would be watching children carrying bags and going to school.
Opet asked the children why they did not go to school. They answered, “We have finished [elementary school]”. The children felt fortunate to have finished elementary school. Some children only attended school to learn how to read and write. Others had no schooling at all. Opet was flabbergasted to hear that.
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Pasawahan village residents mostly work as farmhands. They think it is unnecessary to get a good education in order to become farm workers. Not only is it a waste of time, it also needs funding.
They also have difficulty going to middle schools. Around Pasawahan village there are no junior high schools (SMP), senior high schools (SMA) or vocational high schools (SMK). The nearest high school is around 12 kilometers from Pasawahan. It can take 40 minutes to reach the school by motorcycle, using severely damaged roads.
After thinking hard, he got the idea of inviting Pasawahan residents to discuss education for their children.
Opet could not ignore the situation. For him, education is important to children for their future livelihood. After thinking hard, he got the idea of inviting Pasawahan residents to discuss education for their children.
So, a meeting was held and they initiated the opening of a free school for Pasawahan children. The school was later built on a mutual assistance basis.
As the school was being built, Opet arranged the process of education. It shared with Madrasah Ibtidaiyah (MI/Islamic elementary school) in Pasawahan. From morning to noon, the school was used by MI students. From noon to afternoon, it was used by SMP students.
“We made sure the school not only provided formal education but also taught agricultural science,” said Opet in July 2022. The school was then named SMP Plus Pasawahan. The plus is the addition of agriculture.
Students were taught effective and efficient crop planting. Besides, they were instructed in the strategy of agricultural product marketing. They were learning and practicing. In this way, students earned income partly used to cover the school’s operational costs. The other part was given to students’ parents to help meet family needs. The stigma of schooling as a waste of money could thus be dismissed.
After one year, the school had two classrooms. Now the school has three classrooms for three groups of students belonging to class VII, class VIII and class IX.
Opet and other teachers taught as volunteers. For the fulfillment of their daily needs, Opet and his peers relied on agricultural product sale proceeds.
While in Pasawahan, Opet stayed with residents as well as in the school dormitory. When returning to his parents’ house in Ciamis city, he went by bicycle or walked to save money. After getting married, Opet moved and became a resident of Pasawahan.
Moving
After the mission of the high school building was completed, Opet carried on his dedication as a teacher in MI Pasawvvahan. In the first few years, his salary was just Rp 50,000 per month. His dedication was not only tested by the low salary but also by an earthquake and landslip that caused the school building where he taught to collapse in 2016. The teaching had to take place in emergency tents.
A year later, the school was offered a plot of land owned by the principal of MI Pasawahan at the time on which to construct a building. The land was bought on an installment basis by a foundation with the support of teachers including Opet. The school building is not yet finished. Several rooms have been completed with walls and doors. The rest are still without walls and doors.
However, the rooms had to be used by turns. One classroom was partitioned by using wooden cabinets for study by two groups of students.
Amid the limitations, Opet initiated a nature-based study program for classes of students still without rooms. The students were taken to learn outdoors, from terraces of mosques, of residents’ houses, integrated healthcare centers, rice fields, farmland, to river banks.
Another problem arose when the pandemic occurred. In-person learning was halted to prevent the transmission of COVID-19. Opet was totally bewildered. His students had no gadgets to support distance learning. Besides, internet access in the village was difficult due to its geographic location with hills all around.
“Coincidentally, I had an experience as a disaster volunteer. When I was in a disaster location with difficult access, we communicated by means of walkie-talkies. I finally adopted this method to support distance learning in this village,” he said.
With Opet’s three walkie-talkies and over a dozen borrowed from disaster volunteers around Pasawahan, MI Pasawahan students could follow distance learning. One group comprising six to 10 students was provided with one walkie-talkie to communicate with Opet.
With their musical skill, a number of students have received invitations to perform and get paid.
In MI Pasawahan, Opet also taught his students crop planting. Apart from that, he and his peers gave additional instructions in various skills like music. With their musical skill, a number of students have received invitations to perform and get paid.
“Students skilled in marching, pencak silat [traditional martial art] and drum band playing have often been requested to teach in other schools outside Pasawahan,” said Opet.
Unproportional
The high dedication offered by Opet doesn’t seem to be proportional to the pay he earns. From his job of teaching in MI Pasawahan, Opet now gets a salary of Rp 350,000 per month. The money is not sufficient to meet his family’s basic needs. As a result, the family frequently has to fast.
“I have got my wife and children accustomed to fasting on Mondays and Thursdays. In addition, we also agree that there is one day when we don’t consume rice, we call it one day, no rice. We eat cassava, sweet potatoes or whatever instead of rice to save rice,” revealed Opet with bitter laughter.
Opet has several times considered seeking another job with a bigger salary. Yet he had to cancel the plan after a number of parents visited him to plead with him in 2012.
Opet promptly reflected on it. Eventually he decided not to leave when the people of Pasawahan village needed him. Thank God, the fortune for his family flows in from other sources.
Yayat Hayatul Hasani
Born: Ciamis, 24 September 1986
Wife: Netih Sumiyati, 33
Children: Two
Education: Nurul Hikmah Educational College, Cianjur, Department of Islamic Religious Education
(This article was translated by Aris Prawira)