Schools Anticipate Power Outage

Kompas, page 11

Implementation of this year’s national exams that began with the vocational high school (SMK) level until Wednesday (5/4) was far from the issue of leakage of questions or answer keys. Complaints that appeared were predominantly technical obstacles on the ground, particularly in schools that hold the computer-based national exam (UNBK). Secretary General of the Federation of Indonesia Teachers’ Union (FSGI) Listyarti Retno said, from the FSGI complaints command posts in 29 regencies/cities, although reported to be relatively smooth, but there were technical constraints in the implementation of UNBK SMK. In addition, there were complaints on schools being overwhelmed in meeting equipment and infrastructure to hold UNBK.

According to Retno, FSGI observed, the emergence of technical errors on the ground in addition to the readiness of computers and the Internet, it was also due to the government not well preparing proctors (person responsible for controlling the server in a school).    According to some proctors, with their own facilities which are sometimes far from adequate.

From observation in the field, power outages became one of the major disruptions in UNBK implementation. This was experienced by UNBK participants in SMK Nurul Amanah, Bangkalan, Madura, in the first session on Wednesday.

Meanwhile, a number of SMKs in Semarang, Central Java, were more adaptable to the possibility of power outages during UNBK. Because, on Tuesday, the power went out at 13.30 in a number of schools. As a result, the implementation of the third session of the exam was postponed for half an hour, so it was 14:00 to 16:00.