Tuesday (7/12) PGRI Yogyakarta City in collaboration with the Center for Life-Span Development (CLSD) UGM held a webinar with the title “Providing Accommodation for Students with Disabilities in Indonesia”. This event was held in commemoration of International Day of Persons with Disabilities which is celebrated every year on 3 December.
The event took place at 1.00 PM until 3.45 PM. The event was attended by 200 participants from lecturers, students, teachers, and the general public.
This event was moderated by Elga Andriana, S.Psi., M.Ed., Ph.D, a lecturer at the UGM Faculty of Psychology and the Head of CLSD UGM. For almost three hours Elga accompanied the participants, guided the event, as well as being an interpreter at the event which was held bilingually using English and Indonesian. This event is also equipped with a sign language interpreter so it is friendly for people with disabilities.
In this event, the presenters presented about the efforts to provide accommodation for persons with disabilities from various perspectives. Aswin Widhiyanto, ST., M.A. , Staff of the Ministry of Education & Culture of the Republic of Indonesia, as the first speaker said that the government had made several efforts to strengthen services for persons with disabilities in the educational environment. One of them is that in 2020 training has been held for 5000 regular teachers to strengthen the implementation of special education.
“Indeed, this amount is again not sufficient compared to the existing needs, but (this) is a process. And of course, support from the local government is also expected, from the community it is also expected to fulfill this need, “explained Aswin.
Next Dr. Rozi Beni, Head of Sub-Directorate II of FKKPD Ditjen Otda Kemendagri, as the second speaker at this event explained the role of the Ministry of Home Affairs as a facilitator and coach of local governments in implementing policies from the central government which in this context is the law on the implementation of the provision of educational services and facilities for persons with disabilities. . Rozi explained in detail how local government regulations were realized in the form of real executions. Rozi also stated that the community has a participatory right to participate in providing input and opinions in the implementation of local regulations.
“The community has rights and is protected by law in planning, implementing, and providing supervision,” explained Rozi.
In the third session, the material was filled by Robert Na Endi Jaweng from the Indonesian Ombudsman Commissioner. In his presentation, Jaweng explained a lot about the supervision of public services for students with disabilities. Jaweng explains how the relationship between citizens who give political mandates in elections and economic mandates in paying taxes to the state is so that citizens have the right to claim responsibility for the state, namely through public services in which services for persons with disabilities are also included.
“Indeed, the task of the Ombudsman is to monitor the extent to which the state is accountable for the mandates that have been given to them by citizens, including persons with disabilities,” explained Jaweng while emphasizing that the individual approach that has long been used in the policy of providing education services to persons with disabilities will soon be replaced with a social approach that has wider and comprehensive coverage.
Furthermore, the fifth speaker was filled by Prof. David Evans of The University of Sydney. In his presentation, Evans conveyed about how the Sydney government’s policy system was in drafting an anti-discrimination law for persons with disabilities and how the law was actually applied in the scope of education.
Evans provides an example of the application of anti-discrimination laws in Australia. In the education of prospective teachers in New South Wales, they are required to take courses on disability so that when they become teachers, they already have the provisions to deal with students with disabilities. Furthermore all schools in New South Wales are inclusive schools which are very open to persons with disabilities to enroll as students.
The last speaker was Drs. Sugeng Mulyo Subono, Chairman of the PGRI Kota Yogyakarta. In his presentation, Sugeng hopes that the education office will provide solutions and actively help when teachers at schools have difficulty in providing ideal service facilities for people with disabilities.