Jakarta (VNA) - Indonesia is facing serious challenges in eradicating illiteracy as it consistently is among the bottom 10 countries in international assessments over the past two decades.
The World Bank estimated that 53% of 10-year-old students (or about 13 million primary school students) in Indonesia cannot read or understand a simple text.
The COVID-19 pandemic is believed to have exacerbated this issue, and the country's Ministry of Education, Culture, Research, and Technology has made efforts to mitigate the pandemic's adverse impacts on education.
Indonesia is also grappling with a teaching crisis stemming from a lack of motivation and capacity as well as hasty approaches to systemic issues.
A study by the SMERU Research Institute – an independent institution for research and public policy studies in Indonesia, shows that only about 12% of primary school teachers feel proficient in teaching reading and writing.
Since 2020, Indonesia has implemented 26 items in the Independent Learning-Independent Campus programme to improve the quality of education, including 11 items related to primary schools.
Improving teaching quality is a measure Indonesia is actively promoting to address the "learning crisis" to improve the capacity of 4 million teachers. However, it is estimated that by late this year, new support programmes may reach only about 5% of the 4 million teachers./.
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