It was started in 2021, when Kementerian Pendidikan dan Kebudayaan Riset dan Teknologi (Kemendikbudristek) designed the Merdeka Belajar Kampus Merdeka (MBKM) program. MBKM is a field for the university students to learn outside the campus. This program is open to students from any universities in Indonesia who are in their third semester. Many programs are designed in MBKM, such as Magang dan Studi Independen Bersertifikat (MSIB), Kampus Mengajar, Indonesian International Student Mobility Awards, Bangkit by Google, Goto, Traveloka, etc.
This is a chance for Wayan Gian Nita Pertiwi, student of English Language Education Department (ELED) Universitas Kristen Duta Wacana (UKDW) Yogyakarta to take, to implement the knowledge and subjects she learned since the first semester. Nita saw this as the opportunity to take one step ahead to practice in the education field directly. The journey began at the start of the fifth semester when the Kampus Mengajar program was opening recruitment for the students. Nita directly asked her friends to enroll in this program. After waiting for two weeks and passing the selection test, Nita and her friends got the opportunity to participate in this program for 5 months starting from August to December 2021. Several good experiences she got from joining the program like sharpened leadership, expanded relationships, enhanced speaking skills, and many more.
Seeing that there are so many good things she can explore, in this sixth semester she took this opportunity again by participating in Studi Independen Bersertifikat. Competing with more than 20.000 participants, Nita applied to Zenius.net (the pioneer of online tutoring in Indonesia) as Zenius Educator: Leveraging Technology for Tutoring. Not only that, Nita also was applying to Ruang Guru, MariBelajar, Sekolah.mu, and My EduSolve. All of the institutions are related to the major Nita takes, which is the ELED. It took several weeks to prepare herself. First, she had to prepare documents such as Curriculum Vitae and Organizational experience letter to support. Second, she had to wait for a reply letter from the institution she applied to, not many of them replied but the one which came first was Zenius.
On January 21st 2022, she got a response from Zenius to go to the second selection. She took the test on January 26th 2022. From this selection process, Zenius wants to know more about Nita, how she will be a tutor at Zenius, her personal thoughts about education in Indonesia, solving the special cases, etc. After completing the test, she got an answer from Zenius on January 28th 2022 that she is accepted as Studi Independen students. It was such a hectic way to go.
Joining this program, especially in Zenius is such a big opportunity. In this institution she will learn how to design the syllabus that will be used for real, she will also learn how to manage the class, analyze, observe, predict, and so on. Based on the background knowledge she got from the first until the fifth semester, Nita is ready to work in Zenius. Armed with the subjects that are very related to educational programs such as Public Speaking; Language Teaching Methodology; Curriculum and Material Development; Psikologi Pembelajaran; Academic Essay Writing; etc, Nita will be successful in this program as well.
As a form of support, the Head of ELED UKDW converts this program as much as 20 credits. Because of it, Nita does not need to take any subjects on campus but just focuses on the program. This program will be held from February 21st to July 21st 2022. (PBI/Nita)