Dokarim writing school AA MANGGENG

INTRODUCTION

Thanks to Vergabegruppe, Germany, with whom Tikar Pandan Community has been cooperated to establish a writing school for the students in Aceh. The school name is Dokarim, refers to a folk-poetry who lived during the Dutch Colonial War in Aceh (1873) until the fall of the dynasty of Aceh sultanate (1903). Why the name of Dokarim has been selected to be given to this writing school, the reason is, beside Dokarim himself was not a famous person in Aceh history, but he was the one who took position against the state by taking sides with the victims.

The writing school which is supported by the Vergabegruppe is the third generation of Dokarim writing school. The first writing school was hold before tsunami, while the second generation was hold during June until December 2005 with donation from Hivos – Netherlands.

Dokarim writing school gives scholarship for 15 students (in form of transportation’s expenditure which is given monthly, lecturing materials, course subjects, facilitator and books that could be accessed anytime in Tikar Pandan’s library). The writing school takes six months to be completed, with 8 meetings in a month. Thus, every generation of Dokarim writing school will learn within 48 days with 3 hours of learning in every meeting. .

Many of Dokarim writing school’s alumnus had published their writings in the local media as well as national media.

The curriculum in the writing school is designed participatory. We discover the curriculum from the class dynamic. Thus, the curriculum is made by involving and considering the needs of the participants. In common, there are two plots in the curriculum. The first is introduction of theories that are not taught in the university. Those are philosophy, cultural studies, critical history, research methodology, ‘kampunggrafi’ (to mention anthropology and critical ethnography), sociology, the history of corruption, introduction to human rights and cinematography. The first plot is combined with social analysis and the deconstruction of the principle of basic knowledge. This combination is necessary since education system in Indonesia had put students as object, in order to make them fail to think critically. According to its vision, Dokarim writing school holds to achieve that prior goal. While the second plot is the technique of creative writing. The second plot is designed after considering that students had understood the social realities existed surround and any factors that had caused or influenced those realities. The combination is such 4 months for implementing the first plot and 2 months for the second plot.

The participants are learning either in the class or outdoor. We usually learn in kampong (or village), museums or city landmark. By doing this, we hope that the participants will have social proximity with the realities surrounding. The learning process rests on multimedia approach, besides reviewing texts and discourses that were created by excellent writings and mass media. Memento passionate becomes a creative and critical way as well as film, photos, and interactive discussion. The films that were played always appropriate with the curriculum. After that, the participants would be asked to make reviews that are going to be discussed together. By doing this, we aim to give the participants opportunity to discuss the ideas within the film and to improve their writing’s quality. Finally, they were given chance to publish their writings on mass media. The same process will occur to photos, advertisements and brochures that are going to be reviewed. They have to write and submit something relevant to the theme or monthly curriculum occasionally.

A notebook as a diary will be given to every participant at the beginning of learning process. This is important because in most of the cases, process of writing is usually ignored because they don’t have enough notes about everything. If there is any, it more likes daily activities, not ideas or any inspirations which suddenly come, that could be developed as quality writing. The main point is their notebook will be examined by facilitator or guest lecture occasionally. Sometimes they have to read it also to other participants spontaneously.

Writing a letter to anybody is also becoming an obligatory to every participant. Hence, letter becomes a way to tell story. Aside from that, the facilitator then will evaluate their letter and giving them reply. This is the basic level of entering and finding the strength of writing. The participants are free to write anything, to live their imagination, having dialogue within themselves and to flee their mind.

The concept of this school at the beginning is spare time, the same as the concept of school etymologically in Greek. We are asking the participants to learn on their spare time after they have finished with their routine activities. The concept of spare time had given us chance to say that this school uses playing concept. We are learning while playing. Hence, the second and third generations of Dokarim writing school that are donated by Vergabegruppe were designed as media to heal trauma of tsunami victims. And as the result, besides they have abilities to see the world and the realities with a new perspective at the moment, they also able to write those experiences and making it as spaces for trauma healing.

Dokarim writing school is carried out by a board named School Administer, consist of a headmaster (Fauzan Santa), class administer (Trisfayani), program manager (Mirisa Hasfaria), and finance manager (Yuziana). Besides that, there are also facilitators: Azhari, Fauzan Santa, Reza Idria, A.A. Manggeng and Wiratmadinata. Dokarim writing school also invites experts to become facilitator (see in attachment). According to perception that Dokarim writing school has to be existed, therefore Tikar Pandan community had asked individuals who have commitment with alternative education to become Board of Trustees, are:
- Azhari (Banda Aceh)
- Adila Suwarno (Jakarta)
- Elsa Clave (Paris, France)
- Evi Narti Zain (Banda Aceh)
- Edi Soepadmo (Jakarta)
- Nezar Patria (Jakarta)
- Nirwan Arsuka (Jakarta)
- Nirwan Dewanto (Jakarta)
- Ruth Misnick (Bonn, Germany) and
- Wiratmadinata (Banda Aceh).
Thus, we would like to ask any individual from Vergabeggruppe to become a member of Board of Trustees of Dokarim writing school.


PROGRESS REPORT

The writing class that was donated by Vergabeggruppe has been going more or less 3 months (February – May 2006) and followed by 15 participants who experienced the impact of tsunami (see in attachment). The recruitment had done by publicizing an advertisement in a local daily newspaper (Serambi Indonesia) for 10 days. The participants who had sent the application reached 121 persons. They had to pass interview hold by the team from Dokarim writing school also until we selected 15 candidates only that fill the requirements.

Until May 2006, the participants had started creative writing process and their writing have been published by several mass media, especially newspaper and campus magazine as well as any publication that is published by social institution. The number of information from reliable sources such as newspaper and internet about the space for creative writing is very much supporting their activities. Besides that, some new perspectives have arisen from systematically thinking method in responding issues and social contextual experiences, which colored the forum, discussion and debate among the participants. Thus, access to reading books become important for the participants. At least, there is an interest to understand the reality not only from one perspective.
One thing that is interesting, the participants are now aware that the learning process in the school has not given the participants free choice to express themselves. Contrary to this, here, in Dokarim writing school, they could give input to the learning process, such as having outdoor class by visiting beach, museum, historical sites, kampong or watching movie.