[Bahasa Indonesia]

[News Column]

Coordinator: Setra Y.

Creative Staff: Dian S.

Vision: Inspire, improve, and support education in Indonesia

Mission:

1. Plan and implement projects that would provide practical benefits to the key players in the educational system in Indonesia: educators, students, and learning/educational communities such as schools, community colleges, and universities.
2. Become the meeting point for those who have similar interests and passion for the advancement of education in Indonesia.

Indonesian Christian Orphan Scholarship (ICONS)

ICONS is a scholarship program with a mission to award financial sponsorship for bright and talented Indonesian orphan children to pursue higher education. This program allows deserving high school and middle school graduates to fulfill their academic potential through higher education and use their well-earned privilege to bring positive impact to the society in Indonesia.

Without a third-party sponsorship, many children in Indonesia would give up their dreams to achieve a post-secondary degree. Orphans, when placed at an orphanage, have no opportunities of improving their own livelihoods. Pursuing higher education is almost never an option. When leaving their orphanage, they have to settle for menial or laborious work. Middle school students may choose a vocational school which may train them to be ready for workforce, but might not allow them to continue on to university. High school students are often belittled not only by college tuition, but also university enrolment fees. Therefore, ICONS scholarships are awarded to orphans with no parents, those who are accommodated at orphanages as a result of having low-income families, and others with extenuating financial circumstances. With time, ICONS committee has opted to support children not living at an orphanage when approached by those whom have friends or relatives struggling financially to afford their children’s education. For this reason, ICONS’ definition of an orphan has broadened after encountering many extraordinary cases, most of which involve parents who have no abilities to support their children’s education financially.

This program involves guidance of the recipients by carefully selected mentor who have certain qualifications to guide them academically, spiritually, and vocationally. For recipients living at an orphanage, the orphanage staff members are given this responsibility. The orphanage itself must be screened to ensure their credibility and ability to monitor their residing sponsored children. They are also asked to recommend children with high academic achievement and good behavior to be candidates of the scholarship. For those living outside the orphanage, including orphans who have left their orphanage after high school, individual mentors are assigned to each recipient. 

Upon completion of their education, recipients are expected to contribute to the impoverished Indonesian community. It has been a continuous effort to encourage recipients to achieve this, where the recipients are challenged through regular encounters with their mentors and correspondence with ICONS committee members and volunteers. It is expected from them to start thinking early about how they can use their education for their future and for the betterment of the society around them. Besides, the program is designed in such a way that each of the recipients may learn to equip themselves with a unique sense of identity and a set of skills in order to pass on their aspirations to those in their spheres of influence.

Support for right-based education is an important component to raise the standard of living of those constricted by social structure and disparity, which will lead to the development of Indonesia as a nation. Regrettably, right-based education is rarely available in Indonesia, due to the expensive costs of high-quality education. Scholarship programs like ICONS have the potential to tackle this phenomenon in a small scale and, at large, to promote the role of intellectuals in nation building.

The fund for the scholarship program is collected from generous individual sponsors who are willing to commit for a certain period time – for example, per-semester sponsorship. Besides financial support, this program uses the advantage of having the scholarship committee know the sponsored children in person. This allows sponsors to communicate personally with the sponsored children through correspondence. In addition to building relationships and keeping the sponsors updated, the correspondence is intended to transfer the vision and the urgency of nation building in Indonesia to these recipients.

This program began in July 2007 with three children selected from an orphanage in Surabaya, Indonesia. The said orphanage has been evaluated in contrast with other local orphanages in terms of its operations, style of education and moral guidance, along with the children’s discipline and good manner. One of these scholarship recipients is now an English major at a local university, after achieving exceptional score for English subject in the final national examination (UAN). The two others are enrolled in a private high school (SMU), which is unusual for orphaned children who often opt for vocational school (SMK) due to ease of job seeking. These high school students will later have the opportunity to pursue higher education if they remain qualified for this scholarship.

Your participation and generous commitment in any form is crucial to the advancement of this program. Join us to today!

For more information, please contact:

Setra Yappi

syappi@gmail.com