IPB Ekodaksis Guard Teaches about Character Education by the Riverbanks
The riverbank area is categorized into the slum areas and families who live along these areas are identic with low economic status or non-prosperous. On the other hand, based on the Family Ecology Theory by Urie Bronfenbrenner which explains that one micro environment that has an impact towards children is the surrounding physical environment. This shows that the river ais a main neccesity that must be fulfilled by the families to shape the child’s character. Many facts show that rivers are still a favorite place for children to play, to swim, to soak, and other activites. Sadly, the river’s condition nowadays are no longer clean due the fact that it still is being used as a Garbage Area (TPS) and to Bathe, Wash, and use as a Toilet (MCK) of the local people, leading to suspective uprise of certain diseases.
Beginning from a strong determination to dedicate their progress as students in the midst of a village community, five IPB students created a ecological movement program and embedded character values towards the children of the Cibalok riverbanks. This river is located near Jembatan Merah (Red Bridge), Cibogor Area, Bogor Tengah District, Bogor City.
These five students consisted of Yulian Hadi Nurkholiq, Gita Andi Mauliani, Alfi Khafidathun Nisa, Rizky Astana, and Nusaibah Abdul Aziz. They were under the supervision of Alfiasari, S.P., M.Si, a lecturer of the Departement of Family and Consumer Sciences, Faculty of Human Ecology, Bogor Agricultural University (Dept. IKK Fema IPB) in the Student Creativity Program for Community Dedication (PKM-M) which was funded by the Ministery of Research Technology and Higher Education of the Republic of Indonesia (Kemenristekditkti RI).
“In this ecology movement we call ‘Ekodaksis Guard’ which can be accessed through our instagram account @gardaekodaksis, we are implementing embedment of character through the nine pillars of character which are taught to the children,” Yulian, the Head of PKM-M Garda Ekodaksis explained. The idea of these nine pillars came from Dr. Ir. Ratna Megawangi, M.Sc who is the founder of holistic education based on character of Indonesia and is one of the founders of Indonesia Heritage Foundation (IHF) as well as a lecturer of the IKK Department of FEMA IPB. “We see a large oppurtunity in educating the young generation . We see enthusiasm in the children there to increase their knowledge is quite large, sadly the human resources to teach these values is very limited in the area and leads to a hampered teaching intensity,” Yulian explains.
Yulian explains that one of the forms of the nine pillars is to cultivate waste in order of taking care of the environment, farming thorugh verticulture methods, and also educating spiritual values through educating faith towards God. The Cibalok riverbanks are the main target area of Yulian and the team’s program due to the difficult condition of access towards education.
In preparation of the program, Yulian and his team consultated with their supervising lecturer about the techincal aspects for the implementation at the field, then did further coordination with the stakeholders of Cibogor Area. The Ekodaksis Guard activity is a series of programs which aim to increase knowledge, awareness, and competency of the children towards ecological crisis. Gita Andi Mauliani, a member of Ekodaksis Guard hopes that through this program children will be able to spread many benefits and good impacts to the community. “Education is very crucial in creating character especially during childhood years, this creates a neccessity of embedding independent mindsets since a very young age in hope that they will become the agents of change for a better Indonesia,” Gita explains. For the future, Yulian and his team will create an effort to activate this program and once it has become a sustainable program, they will try to develop cooperation with the related agency, for example, the Environmental Agency. (AVR)
