REPUBLIKA.CO.ID, JAKARTA - Ministry of Education and Culture allocated 2.4 trillion IDR for Early Childhood Education Program in 2013. The allocation is used to develop services, public education and improving competence of teachers.
"We are no longer providing support for infrastructure, such as building, new unit or new classroom. Instead we want to optimize existing infrastructure in community and reach out partners to empower house of worships, like mosques, churches or temples to develop early childhood institutions," Director General of Early Childhood, Non Formal and Informal Education, Lydia Freyani Hawadi said on Friday.
Based on data in 2012 at least 25,834 villages in Indonesia do not have yet early childhood institutions. It will take more than 15 years to build early childhood institutions in Indonesia if government only allocates to build 1,491 buildings per year.
Until December 2012, percentage of children aged 0 to 6 year old who gained early childhood education was only 37.83 percent.