A Certificate for a Teacher

Fiuuhhh…. Everything should be measured by a certificate… I have a friend who are very capable of teaching and educate students but since he doesn’t have the under graduate certificate, the institution just treats him as a part time teacher.

Hmm agree or not agree? It can be difficult to express your opinion directly. However, I try to open my mind about it.
I want to be a teacher when I was around 7 – 8 years old, I didn’t know about how to be a real teacher. I remembered, I just wanted to be like my mom.

I have spent my educational background not in a directly related field to be as a teacher. My parents didn’t allow me at that time to study at IKIP. As I told my story before regarding my background how can I be the teacher, now, I am a teacher.

11 – 15 years ago, our government required all teachers in Indonesia pass teaching certification process (also known as Akta 4). I was very sad, because when I had decided to follow my calling to be a teacher, they required the one thing that I didn’t follow before. Do everyone from IKIP better than me? Do they really willing to connect with students? However, I determined myself to take Akta 4 even though I didn’t know how; I even asked the institution where I worked for, asking them how to register their teacher to take it.

Similar thing happened in the institution I work with until now. They planned to register teachers who had not the teacher’s certificate to the certification process. But it was just a plan ☺ since also our Department of Education from what I know didn’t really enforce it (I really don’t know, either…. It was like between the rock and a hard place. There were lots of student needing lots of educators/teachers, making it difficult for schools/educational institutions to look for suitable teacher if the certificate is a requirement)

Years passed, and nothing gets me closer to be a certified teacher. The school never give us the condition to have our certificate. The only thing they did was to register some teachers name to the goverment.
I didn’t know until my name appeared on the enrollment list for goverment certification process in 2011. The government through the Department of Education required all teachers to have the Teachers’ Certificate through training provided by them to certify all teachers as a professional teacher. Once they require us to collect our own portfolios, next, they changed it to an open training session called PLPG (Pendidikan Latihan Profesi Guru) for 9 consecutive days.

When my name was listed, I was required to follow 9 days of PLPG on July 12 – 20, 2011. This experience was quite cool 😀
I didn’t get acquainted with all teachers there. Are they graduated from teachers’ education? Or are they just happened to be a teacher? Or same happened like me?
I tried to grab all things to do to become a professional teacher. I learned how to be a learner, an educator and not just a regular teacher. My mentor was Ibu Ratnaningsih M.Si, and she gave a lot of confirmation for what I have done.
I felt really good for a lot of things that I have done and of course there are lots still open to adjustment and self-improvement. She also motivated me not to be afraid to be different with others.

Something happened when I was there. The school called me to return while I was in the opening ceremony. They said that the institution asked all their employees to join the retreat (and claimed to never allow the teachers to follow this training, as this was a personal matter because getting Teachers’ Certificate also mean teachers will get extra income – as one of the leader said recently).
Oh my God, it was a dilemma, without getting deeper into the matter here, I tried to understand what the institution’s requirement. But, I were also confused if they would’ve not letting us to get certified, why did they allowed teachers before me to join this training? Even they let the school to register my name and my friend’s name to be certified?

On the other hand, Teachers’ Certificate is a goverment requirement, written in Undang – Undang Guru no. 14, 2005 (Teachers Law No.14, 2005), which requires two things; there should be a quality improvement for teachers and increase in welfare of teachers’ life.
Everyone need an increase in welfare. But often defined as unexpected earnings, so then it can cause someone to act as if they are a mercenary….. It is still really difficult to discuss this idea openly; this is a fairly sensitive area.

I cannot judge myself, whether I am a good educator or not? Do I need improvement in specific area? Only other people, especially my students and my colleagues who can provide feedback about it.

I received my certificate on 3rd of March 2012. I am very thankful and grateful to God for the opportunity that was given to me. I know well that I am an educator, yet, I feel proud that I am now acknowledged by the country, as required by the mandate of the law .
Beyond it all, from the bottom of my heart, I am grateful for the God’s calling in my life to be a lifelong learner, to be a friend to my students and become an educator for my children.

This is my sharing, how about yours?

My favourite quote:
What an illusion to think you can change the world without having first changed yourself – Carl Jung