On November 5th 2008 until November 18th 2008 in regional kopertis III, Applied Approach (AA) training held for senior lecture as the continuation on Program Peningkatan Keterampilan Dasar Teknik Instruksional (PEKERTI), which divides into three generations. What does it mean by PEKERTI and Applied Approach? Hopefully this writing is able to give enough information. Especially for lecture or instructor.

In Tri Dharma Perguruan Tinggi, teaching aspect is the first point besides research and society service. That is why Direktorat Jenderal Pendidikan Tinggi (DIKTI) tried to increase lecture quality in accordance with teacher and lecture law. The law mentions that teacher and lecture have duty and obligation as educator and student, besides that lecture is also demanded to have professional competency, pedagogy, a good personality (furthermore it can be implemented on lecture certification program).  Program Peningkatan Keterampilan Dasar Teknik Instruksional (PEKERTI)  and Applied Approach (AA) are training programs designed by Direktorat Jenderal Pendidikan Tinggi for increasing pedagogy competence to all lectures. PEKERTI is for young lecture, while AA is for senior lecture.

PEKERTI, which is held a few months ago, is used to make lecture able to organize lesson plan according to student’s competency that student will achieve. This lesson plan is based on Kurikulum Berbasis Kompetensi (KBK), when a new study program is opened, such as management Informatika, computer engineering, and other, the first explanation should be on student competencies’ that must be owned by students. Those competencies are Major Competency (Kompetensi Utama), Supporting Competency (Kompetensi Penunjang), and Other Competencies (Kompetensi Lain-lain). For example management Informatika, the major competency (Kompetensi Utama) is ability to analyze and fix a system with supporting competency (Kompetensi Penunjang). In supporting competency students must have the ability to know programming language and English language and other competencies such as communication, team work and other. After that subjects in school are arranged to support those competencies. Every subject must have three component competencies ((KU, KP dan KL). Such as network computer subject has major competency to design, analyze and troubleshooting a network with supporting competency in operation system governance (linux or windows) and other competency such as English language, a good personality and other. So hopefully every lecture will give lesson, test (midterm/finalterm) and assignment based on competency. We must pay attention on KU which is supported by KP and KL so students not only knowing history, inventor or other thing, but the most important thing the major competencies are to (design, analyze and troubleshooting). In PEKERTI lectures are trained to make competency map (Peta Kompetensi) of subject they are teaching so they are able to designed subject appropriately (cluster, procedure or hierarchy to get competency goal are introduced). Finally, lecture must expert in scoring, syllabus or lesson plan (RPP).

Applied Approach (AA) is continuation of PEKERTI. After competency map, syllabus and RPP are made and done, Applied Approach can be used. First step is lesson evaluation to subject that has been teaching, so result will be Subject Reconstruction (RMK). Subject Reconstruction should be done in technology, education policy, approach in education interdisciplinary and etc. Subject reconstruction can change all of the subjects according to evaluation result or just modification in subject. In doing RKM, the head of department should be involved because the change in curriculum might be happened. Suggestion from AA tutor in kopertis, doing reconstruction in subject such as adding a subject or deleting a subject should be done minimally. Annually, changing in curriculum should be done every five years, three years for preparation and two years socialization and trial. After RMK, changing in subject must be done and development technique in lesson plan must be introduced (PBA). In PBA, material written in hard copy or not must be saved to make a good material.  There are four kind of material development, they are: writing by yourself, packaging information, compilation and text manual.

Lesson in class should not always be the same with every chapter in text book, but it should be appropriate with each student competencies’, beside that there should be coordination with other subject so overlapping can be minimalist. Such as project management subject studied in three different subjects in software engineering, project management and project management information system. After GBPP, syllabus and SAP are made, hopefully lecture is able to make lesson role (kontrak perkuliahan) such as regulation in the class, scoring, quiz schedule, Mid term and Final term.

   On the last day, a new and interesting topic is discussed, research on class
Action (PTK). PTK is done by lecture to develop learning and teaching process in the future. PTK is not only for subject material, but also for process, media, scoring can be major attention also. Why A class active and B passive or why students on night class are hard to absorb lesson compare to morning class, hopefully all of the questions are able to answer by doing PTK that is done by responsible lecture. Alternative assessment is introduced in AA training as test equipment; the one that we usually use is (essay, multiple choices, Mid term, Final and other). Finally, for major which has many students, whether we want or not one subject is thought by more than one lecture or teaching team. Semi teaching team has been doing in Bina Sarana Informatika which one subject is thought by more than one lecture and full team teaching which one class is thought by two lecture  minimum (such as final assignment) . This can be considered to be done in the future.

For closing, technical term in PEKERT I- AA must be standardized, because many people become miss understanding. Syllabus that we think as point of material that we must teach is turn out to be conversion of competency map and concept map to design subject in campus (it consists of main lesson, media lesson technique, scoring technique and etc). According to AA tutor SAP that usually made by head department management is should be made by lecture it self. So syllabus can be the same but SAP can be different from one lecture to other lecture. In the future hopefully kopertis regional III is able to socialize PEKERTI-AA program to young lecture and senior in Bina Sarana Informatika. Furthermore according to decision letter MENDIKNAS no. 045/U/2002 government is no longer force campus to do everything according to curriculum but campus can adjust themselves according to competence that want to achieve (Source: UU Guru & Dosen,   Panduan Pelatihan AA Kopertis Wilayah III, Modul Pelatihan dari Universitas Terbuka).