The Role of Leadership in Education for Sustainable Development Curriculum Reform in Indonesian Higher Education

Abstract

This chapter presents a reflective study on the role of leadership in curriculum changes in Indonesian higher education. It was based on case studies carried out in 2012 and 2014 at Politeknik Negeri Jember (POLIJE), a vocational higher education institution (HEI) that was selected by the Ministry of Research, Technology and Higher Education of Indonesia as a pilot project implementation of the newly established Indonesian Qualification Framework. It describes the theoretical and contextual background of the study that was inseparable with the growing concern on globalization, internationalization, and democratization of HEIs worldwide. Meanwhile, curriculum changes since 1961 demonstrated the dynamic of the curriculum, which signified either the development of national education or instabilities in the individual HEIs. These signify the breadth, depth, and the contexts of ESD curriculum development in Indonesian HEIs, which confronted the leaders or managers with the complexity. This requires effective functions related to the change strategy and shared roles between the top and middle leaders in coping with the leadership, managerial, and academic issues within an interdisciplinary setting. In this top-down change, the intention to adopt the transformational leadership model was obvious in the level of top leaders, while in the middle leadership, practices were less hierarchical. The leaders both in the top and the middle levels had complemented to each other with low attention on the notion of organizational learning. In light of sustainable education, the notion of organizational learning gives the foundation for successful change and sustainable organizational development. It is because the best performance of an institution will strongly be influenced by the quality of investment in the capacity development of both the leaders and staff.

Citation

Novawan, A. and Aisyiyah, S. (2020), "The Role of Leadership in Education for Sustainable Development Curriculum Reform in Indonesian Higher Education", Sengupta, E., Blessinger, P. and Yamin, T.S. (Ed.) Introduction to Sustainable Development Leadership and Strategies in Higher Education (Innovations in Higher Education Teaching and Learning, Vol. 22), Emerald Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 145-159. https://doi.org/10.1108/S2055-364120200000022014