COVID-19 has impacted the East Kalimantan, Indonesia, community market, especially for indigenous food and non-food souvenirs. These conditions threaten the global pursuit of SDGs. The University of Mulawarman and PT Aplikasi Karya Anak Bangsa, a subsidiary of Gojek Indonesia, identified social concerns for matching program. Our university team's experience integrating the tridharma led us to offer a five-stage framework: (1) vision internalization, (2) persistence learning, (3) technology adaption, (4) collaboration growth, and (5) outcomes integration. Multi-stakeholder cooperation starts with mutual benefits, ideas, agreements, and program designs. Learning aspects are integrated through final assignments, practical experiences, and organized assignments related to learning outcomes on specific course areas (embedded learning). The emancipated learning of the Independent Campus (MBKM) was implemented at the university level. Outcome-based education for higher education multi-stakeholder matching program is an approach for addressing education SDG.
TopIntroduction
The government of Indonesia defines policy framework to increase human related sustainable development goals (SDGs) on six areas, namely (1) educational access, (2) educational quality (3) synergy between governmental agencies, (4) higher education and industry; (5) industry linkages; and (6) educational incentives (Indrawati & Kuncoro, 2021). Higher education in Indonesia is required by law to have three pillars (tridharma): (a) to achieve competence in a particular field, (b) to research with multiple stakeholders, and (c) to aid in the resolution of societal issues (Irawan et al, 2021).
However, from early 2020 until mid 2022, education SDG (eSDG) achievement suffers a setback. Higher education faced a transformational problem regarding COVID-19 as a significant disruptive agent, disabling the benefit of laboratory hands-on and face-to-face classrooms and tutorials (Martha et al, 2021). Students are not able to conduct industrial internships as the industries also cut expenses to survive during the pandemic era (Wagiran et al, 2022).
From higher education perspective, in this age of pandemics, the final pillar of tridharma is the most important. Referring to the government strategy on leveraging higher education with support from external actors (Rosser, 2022), outstanding teamwork with multiple stakeholders is required for mankind to prosper in the face of the many different facets of social problems produced by the COVID-19 pandemic. Outcome-based education with reference to multi-stakeholder public participation in higher education becomes a paradigm for actively addressing the linked SDGs agenda.
As a case study of industrial survival in East Kalimantan, Indonesia, the traditional market was at stake due to market embracement from conventional face-to-face and in-store showrooms to digital platforms (Astari, 2021). Moreover, in the current condition, inter-islands and international barriers erected to suppress the spread of COVID-19 have taken a heavy toll on the community market, especially for tourism-linked products, i.e., indigenous food and non-food souvenirs (Ketter & Avraham, 2021). These conditions directly challenge the global pursuance of achieving SDGs, particularly decent work, economic growth, and sustainable communities. Limited face to face transaction requires a bridging to provide online offerings and online transactions.
An opportunity was offered by PT Aplikasi Karya Anak Bangsa (PT AKAB), a subsidiary of a well-known unicorn company of Gojek Indonesia. AKAB that has a platform to integrate traditional market to digital economy, but the human resources behind traditional markets need to learn how it works and to provide qualified products to sustain their business. These situations can be mutually solved by a matching program between university and Gojek Indonesia, giving students from universities can educate MSME operators to enter digital market, while also improving the souvenir and food standards. This also directly addresses the issue of loss of quality education through conventional ways. Providing students with real case problems and solutions facing the community and traditional markets was equivalent to an entrepreneurial study by student conducted in bench class (Blesia et al, 2021).
This matching program is best fit with emancipated learning (merdeka belajar), partly defined as a participatory learning model initiated by the Ministry of Education, Culture, Research, and Technology (MoECRT) as a main agenda in 2019-2024 (Purwanti, 2021). For the matching program scheme that was initiated by the MoECRT, the University of Mulawarman and PT AKAB collaborated to identify several social issues. The societal issues are assisting (1) the digitalization of souvenir businesses, (2) the improvement of the availability, quality, and certification of online ghost kitchens, and (3) the initiation of Food Bank as a meeting platform to solve food waste and food rationing for individuals who are in need. To successfully implement the eSDG framework, the solutions are crafted and put into action with the participation of multiple stakeholders. For the higher education, direct feedback of the program was to invest in student competences and skills, hence preparing them for better job in the future (Ollivaud, 2021).