JAKARTA: Rahima, 32, has been teaching in the Indonesian state of East Nusa Tenggara for nine years on the island of Alor. Despite having a bachelor’s degree in education, she works five days a week as an honorary teacher at a public elementary school, earning only approximately 300,000 rupiah (US$18.50) monthly. Honorary teachers are mainly assigned the same duties as full-time teachers and get an honorarium based on the number of hours they work.
Rahima sells coffee and candlenuts on her days off to augment her income, which is a small portion of the minimum provincial wage of roughly 2.3 million rupiah. Rahima may see a pay increase to 2 million rupiah per month due to President Prabowo Subianto’s teacher pay increase, which goes into effect this month.
During a National instructors’ Day event on November 28, Prabowo announced a two million rupiah allowance for part-time instructors in state schools and a 100% basic wage increase for state teachers. According to news site Jakarta Globe, he claimed that the pay adjustment will cost an extra 16.7 trillion rupiah, increasing the overall budget for teachers’ welfare to 81.6 trillion rupiah (US$5.1 billion) in 2025.
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