On Thursday Feb 17 the British Council Indonesia launched 8 new UK – ID English Digital Innovation Grants during a special live event online. The official launch included keynote speeches from Sir Steve Smith, UK International Education Champion, Prof Iwan Syahril, Director General of Teacher and Education Personnel, Ministry of Education, Culture, Research and Technology and Hugh Moffatt, Country Director Indonesia. 

In the autumn last year, with the support of the UK Department for International Trade (DIT) and the Ministry of Education, the British Council Indonesia launched an open call inviting grant applications for UK-ID digital innovation projects. The aim of these projects is to strengthen professional development for English teachers in schools and lecturers in higher education institutions across Indonesia. 

ELT companies, EdTech organisations, and universities, were invited to partner and bid for grant funds to design, develop, pilot, and evaluate TPD resources with the potential to be used at national scale. 17 proposals high quality proposals were received. Following detailed proposal evaluation, supported by the Indonesian Ministry of Education, 8 UK-ID English Digital Innovation projects were selected to received funding and a green light to proceed. 

Professional development for pre-service and inservice English teachers in schools

Four of these projects are specifically designed to support professional development pre-service and inservice English teachers in schools across Indonesia. Over the next 15 months, these partners will develop specific new teacher training materials which in future will be available to all training (pre-service) and serving (inservice) English teachers. The objective is to co-create and pilot the resources now with a view to longer term scalability and sustainability. 

Bell (Cambridge) and Universitas Kristen Satya Wacan will be working together to provide teacher development courses to English teachers in the SoE region in Eastern Indonesia. The aim of this pilot is to specifically to support teachers in rural and remote areas with limited access to the internet and technology – requiring low tech support. 

Peartree languages (Cardiff, Wales) and Dompet Dhuafa will be working on Nusantara-Go! This programme focuses on the 21st century competencies of teachers of primary and secondary school aged children in the rural context. It will be conducted in 8 rural areas which are divided into three regions, namely disadvantaged, outermost and frontier. These are commonly called the 3T in Bahasa Indonesia.

The ELT Consultants and Indonesia Technology Enhanced Language Learning (iTELL) will be working on DIGI. This partnership project, designed by ELT Consultants and iTELL, aims to strengthen 300 secondary English teachers’ competence, performance and effectiveness in integrating technology and digital tools / technology into their teaching (both in the classroom and online). 

Nile ELT (Norwich, UK) and Eduversal will be working together to create and pilot localised versions of three established NILE online courses. You will hear more about this project from Mike Riley from NILE in a little while. 

Bell, Nile, Peartree Languages and the ELT Consultants are among the very best ELT Teacher training companies in the UK, in the world in fact, and we’re delighted that through these British Council grants we can help to create these exciting partnerships with the best ELT experts in Indonesia. These four projects will be designed to align, and support, the Ministry of Education’s teacher professional development initiatives – both face to face and online. 

Professional development for English and EMI lecturers in Higher Education institutions

The other four projects are designed to support professional development for English lectures and EMI lecturers in Higher Education institutions. 

Polytechnic Negeri Pontianak and Polytechnic Negeri Malang will be working with leading academics from the University of Glasgow, the University of Reading and the University of Edinburgh to develop a MOOC (massive open online course) for EMI lectures. 

We know there is a growth in International Course Programmes in Indonesia – course taught in English – and in order for these courses to succeed it is essential that Indonesian lectures are proficient in English and confident using English to teach – this partnership is designed to specifically to help them. You can read more about our insight into EMI trends in Indonesia in our recent research report here

Universitas Indonesia and the University of Sheffield will be working together on the EMI Pathfinder Project. The aim of this project is to increase EMI capability, confidence and capacity in higher education institutions across Indonesia.  This will be achieved through the co-design and delivery of an intensive course PAIRING subject lecturers AND English lecturers. 

The City of Glasgow College and Politeknik Negeri Batam are already working together as part of the UK’s Skills for Prosperity programme. Through this UK-ID English Digital Innovation Grant these partners will develop teaching resources to build EMI and Academic English capacity. 

The University of York will be working with Universitas Pendidikan in Bandung to improve the provision of general English and English for academic purposes to university students, university academics – as well support language training for prospective scholarship awardees.

All of these capacity building projects form a key part of the British Council English for Education Systems (EES) work in Indonesia. Working closely with the Indonesian Ministry of Education, Culture, Research and Technology, our work aims to improve the quality of English language teaching, learning and assessment in Indonesian schools and higher education institutions. 

If you would like to more about our UK-ID English Digital Innovation Grants and / or our broader EES  in Indonesia please visit our country website, our YouTube channel, or write to ees.indonesia@britishcouncil.or.id