Since the pandemic hit the world in 2020, human life does not seem to be the same as before. The term digitalization is becoming more popular because everything has become digital. In the pandemic, we could not have a physical interaction to prevent the virus from spreading. As a result, activities in almost every important aspect of human life shifted to the virtual.
Education also changed dramatically. Due to the lockdown policy, every school was closed, which resulted in some loss of learning. Indonesia should not be excluded from this phenomenon. In March 2020, starting from Jakarta, schools in Indonesia were moved to an online system due to the rapid spread of the virus. Since then, the curriculum has been slowly updated and adapted until the new normal era that is coming now.
One of the latest curricula – which is also being used this time – is Kurikulum Merdeka Belajar. It is literally translated as “Freedom of Learning Curriculum”. This curriculum, quoted from the official website of Kurikulum Merdeka by the Ministry of Education and Culture, states that it is an effort to cure the learning crisis in Indonesia – which has been worsened by the pandemic.
The principle in designing this curriculum, according to the literature review of Kurikulum Merdeka by the Ministry of Education, is developed by considering the vision of Indonesia’s education, theories and the result of research on curriculum design together with all the practical issues from various literature and discussion with experts.
The question is: Is this really a freedom for students?
Considering the principles mentioned in the literature review of Kurikulum Merdeka, it is indeed mentioned about the flexibility and focusing on the competency and character of the students. In the point of focusing on the competency and characters of the students, the curriculum tries to reduce the material in the learning process together with the learning time and the mass of learning material through the project activity. In fact, theoretically it is a freedom for students to explore their ability by doing some project.
However, the reality seems to contradict this theory. According to Neva (2022) on her research found that students seem to lose their willingness to learn while this curriculum is implemented. It is because the school still does not assess for the talent and interest of the students, therefore the learning is not suited to the students. Another problem is the problem of laziness as the learning style emphasizes on the freedom of learning. If we judge from this, should the curriculum provide a proper medicine of our crisis?
Even though it has several problems, this curriculum also provides opportunities for students to develop their skills. For example, in higher education, the Merdeka Belajar curriculum provides more opportunities for students to participate in student exchange, whether among Indonesian universities or among foreign universities.
The key point here is that this curriculum cannot provide the best solution for all parties, but it still has the advantages for some other parties. To conclude this statement, I would like to ask you a somewhat tricky but fascinating question. How should we define freedom in learning?
