UNS — A student of Universitas Sebelas Maret (UNS) Surakarta managed to carve another achievement at the national level. Apri Pendri, a student of Doctoral Program in Indonesian Language Education, UNS won 2nd place in the National Essay Writing Competition in commemoration of National Teacher’s Day organized by the Doctoral Program in Language Teacher Training (UNP). This competition takes on the theme of “Optimizing Teacher Professionalism in Improving the Quality of Education in the Globalization Era.”
When contacted by the uns.ac.id team on Tuesday (28/12/2021), Apri admitted that he was happy with his achievements. “I felt happy at that time, and I also did not expect this outcome because I had written the essay for a long time, and coincidentally, the theme matched the competition,” explained Apri.
In his writings, Apri chooses a theme familiar to his profession and background as an educator. Now he is a lecturer at Adzkia Padang University. Apri wrote an essay entitled “Freedom to Learn or Learning Freedom.” He highlighted the Merdeka Belajar Kampus Merdeka Program (MBKM), a program which the government encourages.
“This essay talks about the Freedom of Learning (Merdeka Belajar), which the government is heavily promoted. Unfortunately, there is actual independence that some Indonesian education practitioners have not yet experienced. There are still gaps in access to education, social discrimination for our special needs friends, and uncertainty about teachers’ financial well-being in Indonesia, especially part-timer teachers,” he explained.
In this championship, the competition is held virtually. In the early stages, Apri sent his essay through Google Drive. After the essay is submitted, the committee checks for plagiarism in the manuscript. Then, the essays that have been checked are submitted to two professors and writers at UNP as the judges. After going through these processes, Apri was declared the second winner in early December.
Apri admitted that he was interested in participating in this competition because he felt that the education field was not doing well. Hence, through his writing, he could voice the issue. “A strong reason that encourages me to take part in the competition is that I know that the education sector is currently not doing well, and this must be our collective responsibility to solve it. Coincidentally, this competition became one of my media outlets where I can talk about this issue, especially during teacher’s day,” said Apri.
In the future, Apri hopes that this achievement can be a trigger for him to do better. “Hopefully, it can be a motivation to accomplishing a better achievement than today’s achievements in the future. This is a trigger for me to do more,” said Apri. Humas UNS
Reporter: Zalfaa Azalia Pursita
Editor: Dwi Hastuti