dosen diaries: first year

Somewhere around this month one year ago, a couple of months after graduating from grad school, a friend of mine asked me to join a university he's working at and I said yes. No, it was definitely not at the top of my list as a place for me to dedicate all my life. My first choice was a university where I earned my bachelor's degree located in my hometown. However, there are as many universities as ways to get into the universities. Long story short I keep my eyes open to any opportunities. The longer story is that the university I was looking forward to getting into is a public university, they did not really have any openings at that time, and even when they eventually had any openings several months later on, the department I would love to apply and being part of sadly did not open. Even though I know it's not a guarantee I would be accepted even if it did open and I did apply. So, here I am, a one-year-old lecturer at a small private university located at the frontier, outermost, least developed island, a one-night-travel by ship away from my island, not that far but not that close either. The bad news is I'm questioning and second-guessing myself every day as always just like in any other era of my life. The good news is I'm also doing my best every day trying to figure things out.

I've learned that working at a university as a lecturer is not only about teaching the students. There are other two responsibilities, researching and contributing to society. Together they are called Tridarma, within the context of three main jobs as a lecturer at a university. I believe the word is from Sanskrit, a language from old Hinduism or old Indonesian civilizations something because Hinduism used to be a thing in Indonesia. Tri means three and Darma means rightness? My middle name is actually Budidarma. Budi means mind? So, I'm kinda happy but also feel pressured by such a name actually. What I'm trying to say is I'm thankful to my dad for choosing such a cool name for me. I'll make sure to find a great name for my kid as well. If I ended up getting married to someone. If I ended up getting a kid. Well, there are so many things going on and I'm not the most optimistic person on Earth.

I like teaching and I've been doing it for a while. I've been involved with elementary, junior high as well as high school students in the past. So, I'm genuinely happy I've come so far to finally being able to teach university students right now. The thing is, my high expectations may or may not meet the reality. I'm teaching at a place where it is not considered as a city and not even a town. The human resources or the learners are the reflections of the situations around them including but not limited to access to information, technology and education. This is the result of how Indonesia is a big country, or we can even call it huge, and it's not only one great land because it is an archipelago type of country. In other words, some places may have better conditions compared to others is what I'm trying to say. However, I always believe that every student always has a chance to grow. My job is to keep showing up every day.

The second responsibility as a lecturer is publishing research every semester. I've been passionately working on research thingy since my grad school years so it is nothing new. However, it's only been two semesters but I already started to notice that the system needs a series of discussions. On the one hand, one research publication for one semester may look good for productivity. On the other hand, it is somewhat too demanding in some ways. How could other lecturers keep coming up with their publications? I'm both kind of surprised and wonder how could they do any of that all these times? Don't get me wrong. I love doing research. I really do. But we need to talk a lot about this thing.

The third one of the Tridarma is community service. Well, I'm not quite sure if this is the correct order but I guess that's how I think of it. And that's how other people and lecturers used to mention them. Doing things for free or collectively being part of something giving back to society as a volunteer is nothing new for me. This is thanks to the people I was growing up with during my college life back in the day and even years after graduating from my first degree and my second degree. I've heard it could be anything but I'm focusing on teaching for several meetings at different schools for now.

So, if you're the type of guy or girl who finds all these three activities as something fun then you can definitely consider being a lecturer at any university. Well, actually there are many other things beyond Tridarma. So far I've experienced being part of committee handling the legendary part of being a university student in Indo, it used to be called KKN (or kuliah kerja nyata) but nowadays different uni calls it different name. It is called KBM (or kuliah berkarya bersama masyarakat) which is the same thing. And because I'm at the faculty of education and teacher training so there is also something called PPL (or praktik pengalaman lapangan) I don't know why this one doesn't really have different name. I've had stories about these two. I'll think about it whether or not I'm gonna share it here as well. Universities also have something called yudisium (basically it's like graduating from faculty) and I was being part of the committee. And then wisuda or graduating from the university where I was not part of the committee yet. Then when the new school year is starting there will be something like orientation (I think I was being part of it but I wasn't really actively and responsibly being part of it and I don't really remember why. There is also an advisory duty where lecturers are advising the students for their final project which is skripsi which is an undergraduate research. And then examiner duty where lecturers get to see the students presenting their research to give questions or comments or whatever. Now that I've finally carefully mention them all here it does seem like a lot of work. I didn't even notice it before. There may or may not other activities that I possibly forgot to mention. But this is all I can think of now.

Furthermore, I also want to talk about how for the past two semesters I don't have enemies but it also means I don't have friends. I've involved with a drama during my first semester and I think I've spilled the tea on the other writings. Well, basically I participated in a national recruitment to be part of one of public universities but I failed because my scores were not meeting the passing grade and it was only the first part of two parts of the test but the problem is I didn't know back then that we were not allowed to join such national recruitment so the drama happened people were hating then I was apologizing and all. I also forgot to mention that I had a chance to be the head of library for my first semester but then I've decided to  let it go after the drama because I felt bad. For my defense I was not the only one committed such crime of joining that national recruitment because there are also others as well. And all of us letting go our additional duty/position right after the drama. So, I think and I hope it's fair for everyone. This particular drama caused me to kind of had enemies and then not having enemies and not having friends. I mean I'm okay with everyone but I haven't really found any people I can consider and feel close with. Well, except a friend who asked me joining the university one year ago. We keep being good friends.