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| Katrina Wallis mempresentasikan penelitianya tentang pesantren |
Australian Student Consortium for In-country Indonesia Studies (ACICIS) who was studying in University of Muhammadiyah Malang (UMM), Katrina Wallis was impressed when she did a research in Islamic boarding school An-Nur 2 Bululawang and Ar-Rifa’i Gondang Legi. She even had time to participate (nyantri) in these Islamic boarding schools in Malang district for two weeks.
“I was involved in many activities with the students. We used one bedroom for about 70 people with a few ventilations,” said Katrin, who wore Islamic clothes when she was in Islamic boarding school. The same clothes which she wore when presenting her research result in campus I UMM on Monday (6/11).
Her interest in researching Islamic boarding school was based on a big question about how Islamic boarding school prepared its students to face the rapid modernization. “I examine how the education management is applied, the facilities, and the curriculum that is used as a rank to face modernization,” Katrin said. There were a number of students, teachers, and school administrators as the informant.
Katrin discovered some interesting conclusions. Those two Islamic boarding schools agreed that modernization must be faced by giving strong religious knowledge to its students. On the other hand, the students were provided with mastery on technology, both in the curriculum and in the facilities. “In the two Islamic boarding schools, the students were taught about computer skill, learning Qur’an via online, and even the students in Ar-Rifa’i were allowed to bring laptop,” added the last semester student of Flinders University Adelaide Australia.
The unique thing was, although the students had been taught about information technology and had interesting website and blog, gender equality which part of modern curriculum has not been applied yet. “The students are female but the teachers are still dominated by male. There is no female teacher,” regretted Katrin. Actually, female teacher could be the model on how women should play a role in public sector.
Katrin’s advisor Widiya Yutanti, MA measured that Katrin’s research was success. The interview with the informants held openly because Katrin succeeded to explore the informants by engaging in the school. “Islamic boarding school world is unique. As the alumnus, I can feel how the demands in facing the real life. My parents sent me to the Islamic boarding school because they felt that they did not have enough time and skill to teach me to face the modernization,” stated Widiya, the coordinator of ACICIS UMM.
Besides Katrin, there were six more ACICIS students from Australia and two students from United States who presented their research result until Tuesday (6/12). Rianna Tatarelli for instance; critically, she researched about the effect of Mall construction toward traditional markets in Blimbing and Dinoyo, Malang. According to her, traditional market not only effected on economic field but also on cultural field. Rianna concluded, modern market might be built only if the traditional transaction process still maintained.
Meanwhile, other student, Dale Druhan, conducted research about environmental education at schools in Malang. He concluded that the education about keeping cleanliness and environmental was only success in school area but in the outside of school area was still being a problem. Students were disciplined at school, however, in their house and others social environment, they might not keep the cleanliness.
Another interesting research was conducted by Wyatt Gordon, student from American University Pentagon. He researched about ceramic industry in Dinoyo, Malang. He said, in US, there was not any house being a factory. In Malang, however, the ceramic factory was closed since the economic crisis on 1998. Therefore, ceramics that used to be produced in a factory were produced in houses now. “It is interesting. Houses become small factories and ceramic shops,” said Wyatt.
It was regretted, then, the houses industry was lack of successful marketed. It was because not only the limited production, the access to get to the kampong ceramic was also not wide enough. “There is not parking area in kampong ceramic, because it is not a wide road. The houses were the factory employee home before, not shops,” stated Wyatt. He suggested, the closed factory was used as a ceramic tourism object because it had parking area that could exhibit the ceramics product. (uci/nov/nas/t_rys)
