CENTRAL PAPUA – The Papuan Taruna Boarding School Timika held a Science Potential Competition for elementary and junior high schools in Mimika to improve the quality of education for the younger generation. A total of 322 participants from several elementary and junior high schools in Mimika participated in the competition, this competition was also a form of commemoration of National Education Day.
Representative Head of Lokpon Education Foundation in Timika, Andreas Ndityomas said, in this competition, Taruna Papua Boarding School cooperates with the Universal Learning Center and this competition is purely assessed by the Universal Learning Center, “100 percent of the assessment will be carried out by the Universal Learning Center, so we Taruna Papua Boarding School only prepare the facilities, Taruna Papua Boarding School does not interfere with the assessment,” said Andreas.
Organizing this competition is to raise superior seeds or young people in Mimika, so that later in the next 21 years children can become leaders in their regions.
YPL as an education partner of the Amungme and Kamoro Community Empowerment Foundation, which manages the PT Freeport Indonesia partnership fund, is ready to jointly improve the quality of education in Mimika Regency. Basic education is not only about reading, writing, and counting (3M), but how to prepare a better and superior future generation, especially in the field of science, “we hope this program can run and be sustainable, and our intention is to gather all schools to strive together to improve the quality of education, because the quality of education is not the task of one school or one foundation but a shared task,” said the Amungme and Kamoro Community Empowerment Foundation.
Head of the Elementary School Division at the Mimika Education Office, Stanislaus Laiyan, said that the breakthrough made by the Taruna Papua Boarding School is a form of improving the quality of education in Mimika, so this needs to be supported by all parties and he revealed, activities like this will continue to be carried out and supported by the Government through the Mimika Education Office and maybe in the future it will be carried out larger throughout the Province, especially now that there are activities from the center, namely the National Science Olympiad.
Meanwhile, the Principal of Taruna Papua Dormitory Johana M. Tnunnay said that the preparation for this science competition had been carried out for 3 months, namely:
- Requesting permission to the Mimika Education Office,
- Providing training to teachers at other schools,
- Submitting permits to other schools.
Johana M. Tnunnay explained, the enthusiasm of the school can be seen from the number of participants as many as 322 participants from 60 schools both elementary and junior high school levels and for the number of elementary science participants there were 64 people, elementary mathematics participants there were 62 people, junior high school science there were 64 people, the number of junior high school social studies there were 66 people and junior high school mathematics participants there were 66 people.
Universal Learning Center representative Titis Setiobudi said, in this science competition, the elementary level is divided into 2 fields, namely social studies and mathematics, while at the junior high level there are 3 fields, namely science, social studies and mathematics. The Science Potential Competition is currently being held to trigger children in Mimika to be more familiar with science, and can also provide an overview to children to be able to compete at the national and even international levels.
