Scholarship / Children's Literature, Media and Culture (CLMC) - Erasmus Mundus Scholarship Essay [2]

Erasmus Mundus scholarship essay

Hello everyone, my name is Soca from Indonesia. In accordance with the title of this thread, I ask for your help in providing feedback on the essay that I will use this year (intake 2022) for the Erasmus Mundus scholarship.

Essay:
I graduated in 2020 with a Bachelor of Arts degree from English Language Teaching at the State University of Malang, Indonesia, and I am passionate about developing learning media. The first time I was interested in developing learning media was when I attended the Instructional Media & Activities in Language Teaching (IMALT), Coursebook Evaluation, and TEFL (Teaching English as A Foreign Language) courses. In those courses, I received guidance in the development of conventional and digital learning media. However, I used to experiment more in making and using conventional learning media such as handmade media or using books as references in educational organization activities or working as a tutor.

During my undergraduate study in Malang, I actively participated in communities work on literacy. I joined the Malang branch of the Indonesian Children Literacy Movement (GPAN) organization in 2017 until 2018 where the team and I implemented several programs to improve children's literacy in Malang. For instance, creating literacy seminars, visiting various book clubs, social foundations, orphanages, schools, and socializing the importance of improving literacy skills. All of these efforts have shown significant results. At the end of 2018, there was an increase of 20% to 30% in the literacy skills of children in Malang. However, I understand that the cultural approach to normalizing literacy culture is not sufficient to improve reading levels in Indonesia, since based on the ranking of the Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) in 2018, the literacy level of Indonesian children is still ranked 73 out of 79 countries members of PISA around the world. It means that the literacy for the lower age group remains steady.

Based on those, I realize that books take big roles in literacy development. The functions of books as sources of knowledge and literacy material which are equally important as foreign language literacy, especially English in this modern era. The magnitude of the role of reading materials and English can affect the quality of a nation. Furthermore, in English learning context, data from the EF English Proficiency Index 2020 shows that Indonesia positions as one of the lowest countries in English proficiency rate. This is problematic, since in 2045, Indonesia is predicted to experience a demographic bonus where most of the population are in their productive age (15 - 64 years old). This issue and target motivate me to contribute in advancing Indonesian education, specifically in the field of children literacy and English, and this aspiration leads me to apply for CLMC. Specifically, CLMC will be very suitable to the situation in the area where I live where many children and older residents aged 20 and over experience school dropout at their young age due to many conditions, one of them is their low awareness toward education. Due to this situation, I believe that a comprehensive education related to my expertise in education will be a profound provision, and I see CLMC as the right path.

According to CLMC website, there are several goals of the program, they refer to the development of children's and young adults' understanding toward the production and consumption of multimodal texts by combining culture and creativity through rigorous research, consider the challenges of integrating multiliteracy into diverse educational contexts and policies. Furthermore, the program will also broaden the view of how texts and media for children reflect the developmental challenges of adolescents and how they can increase basic social awareness and generate social change through worldwide trends. I believe these two are the most striking and most needed for Indonesia to exist in the learning process, and in fact that the program provides more goals than two that I mentioned before would be even more beneficial than I could imagine.

By being a part of CLMC, I would acquire 'media making for children and young adults' ability from courses such as Cross boundaries: Children's literature and other media, New media for children and young adults, and Reviewing children's and YA books. Meanwhile, from the courses such as Developing reading programs for different contexts, Promoting reading through cultural activities, and Children's literature for a diverse world, I would be able to develop skills in increasing Indonesian children's willingness to read in various contexts, both local and international scale through media. Besides, there are many more courses that would be beneficial for me. Regarding that, I plan to discuss the topic of the impact of using UK English textbooks on the English literacy skills of bilingual immigrant children in the UK as my dissertation. I choose that, since it would be very useful for me to learn how to conduct English textbooks (as a lecturer in the future) that fulfil multicultural children's needs in Indonesia since the UK is in the first rank of the education system in the world. Besides, UK has more than 660.000 immigrants in 2021. These data show that the UK is a multicultural country like Indonesia.

After finishing my study, I have two plans regarding my career path. First, I plan to develop my English course and mini-library into an English course and public English Self Access Center (ESAC) for all ages with sufficient technological facilities, adding to the collection of English books by adjusting the required language level and age, and also developing human resources for English teachers. I will also write a proposal for support and cooperation from the local government, to provide rules for its citizens. For example, certain age groups are strongly advised to take English courses on certain days, so that each age group will have the same learning rights. The course and public ESAC can also be a way for undergraduates of English Language Teaching like me to work as teachers, facilitators, or staff. I will not charge any fees from basic programs at my course or ESAC, the costs that will be used for the first capital of this course is from my family store (selling electronics tools). Therefore, it is hoped that the community will be able to feel the pleasures of learning so that their knowledge will improve.

Second, I want to be a lecturer. A lecturer has such numbers of duties such as teaching, writing textbooks, being a member of a committee/body at a university, and many more. These tasks would make me easier to strengthen my goals and network in the advancement of literacy and English learning in Indonesia. As a part of my implementation in one of the lecturer duties, I would also be part of the Education and Learning Development team or the Office of International Affairs of the university. Both of them have a strong role in maintaining the quality of the academic community, locally and globally. In this case, the contexts that I want to deepen are literacy and English.

Regarding the moving scheme of study between countries determined by EMJMD, I can confirm that I am an adaptive person, thanks to my active involvement in a number of various organizations and events at national or international level. With additional networks that I will gain while studying in Europe, I will be connected with other experienced EMJMD alumni from around the world with the aim of equitable literacy in low-rate literacy countries.