Model communication system for improving rural education in Indonesia

MECS is a development program, and has implications for a long-term rural development effort which emphasizes communication at the village level. Some of the issues discussed are textbook use, teacher training, satellite communication, non-formal education, radio, and audio cassette technology. The radio focuses on ways the media can be used to improve the educational opportunities of people living in rural areas. It concerns the immediate future, and it presents a program which the Department of Education and Culture can implement within the policy guidelines. There has been enough experience with most of the system to have confidence in the model. The system is easily expandable. The recommended project involves using satellite communication, radio broadcasting, and audio cassette technology into a system which can provide Indonesian villages in the farthest provinces with the latest educational information and assistance from national and provincial centers. The report recommends setting up the system in at least three provinces as demonstrations. Television is not included as a central component, but a model is provided for the use of television later on as a part of an overall system.