Ippar Model: Character Building Program Strategy In Religion Based School

Abstract

Every school has a strategy to apply a positive value to students, such as religion-based schools which is concerned to the character education for the important point. This is the background and the purpose of this research to know about communication strategies for the plan and applying character study program in religion-based school. Respond to the purpose of the research, the researcher uses the model of communication strategy of IPPAR Model (Insight-Program Strategic-Program Implementation-Action and Reputation). This research is included in the public relations sector with the cultural approach. While the research design is in a qualitative approach with the case study. The informant who involves are school authorities included parents and students which is in Daarut Tauhiid Vocational School and Santa Maria High School. The sampling technique is purposive sampling. The result of the research finds that the character- education program is a joint program between Government, Educational Institutions, and the Student Parents. There are two assembling strategies of character education programs 1) internal approach and 2) external approach. The internal approach uses internal media such as wall magazines, billboards and movie media. The external approach uses the teacher exemplary. Application for control system character education with homeroom monitoring and study guidance for using the contact book. The controller system helps the connection between Parents and Teachers to apply character education. Those approach keeps relating to government curriculum “kurtilas”. This step is conducted to open society’s view that religion-based school is inclusive.

Keywords: Communication strategy, Internal media, IPPAR model, planning, religious-based school

Introduction

Character is the personal identity to be known by everyone, either themselves or others. Personal character cannot be assessed at the first interaction, but the intensity of interaction will make each other know the character of each individual. Character can also be interpreted as a personality formed by the surrounding environment. If the environment is positive then the character is built positive, and vice versa. Therefore, a conducive environment is needed to instill and form good character in children.

Educational institutions are one of the main institutions which is responsible for shaping the character of students. In school environment, students will get positive values ranging from friends to teachers. At school, students train themselves to be personal with superior character. Like, practicing honesty, manners, courage, confidence, a sense of responsibility, supportive, and others.

Character education is a very important education for developing students' values and character. Overall, character education focuses on education that is not limited to making students become human beings who is excellent and smart, but it makes students as good and superior individuals. This is useful for us alone, as a provision to continue the life of society by taking into account the social order of society in accordance with moral values. Characteristic education is not only learning about what is right and wrong to children but also it is more that characteristic education instills a good habit which is understood by students to be felt and do something good. Characteristic education is a mission that is similar to moral education (Kamaruddin, 2012).

The importance of character education by instilling moral values is a joint task; it is not only for educational institutions, but also for the family as the first institution of children to recognize moral values. Therefore, the family as a foundation should nurture and direct the child's growth and development with reference to the child's character. This is in line with the results of previous studies which state that parenting children really determine the character of children (Khodijah, 2018). That is, if children are educated at home and they are accustomed to speak honestly, politely, and responsibly, then the child outside the home environment will treat others as he is treated by his parents.

Moral values such as responsibility, mutual respect are things that must be applied starting from the family environment to school environment. These moral values will encourage children or students to do what they should do. Students also feel responsible for doing these moral things even when he does not want to do those things.

The application of character education in school environment is also supported by the government. The support is through an integrated learning package called the curriculum. In Indonesia, the education curriculum has been changed for several times. Substitution aims to improve the quality of education in Indonesia. The last curriculum that is still used in the school environment is the 2013 curriculum called kurtilas. Curriculum 2013 is a program of character-based student learning materials. Kurtilas also puts forward to the way of integrated thematic learning. The curriculum issued by the Indonesian Ministry of Education and Culture (KEMENDIKBUD) during the leadership of Anies Baswedan as Minister of Indonesian Education and Culture, who emphasized the main aspects of learning, namely character. This is in line with President Jokowi's government tagline that promotes the Mental Revolution program. Program which aims to shape the character of people who started from the educational environment. Refer to Figure 1 below for the ‘Kurtilas Curriculum Achievement Targets’.

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Schools as educational institutions hold the responsibility in implementing the character education system. Education is not only able to produce student competencies in various fields, but also students must also get education and guidance on moral values that can shape student character. The importance of character so that the kurtilas curriculum also puts the quality of character in the first position; it is continued in the competence and reading ability of students. The magnitude of the responsibility of schools in educating student character, the school institution must have a special program regarding the cultivation of student character. The program is continuous and consistent so that results can be measured. Previous research also mentions that character development in children can be started from simple things, step by step, but done consistently. “Kurtilas” curriculum is mandatory used by school included religion-based school. This policy is to prevent judgment of exclusive school, but all of schools are same or inclusive. However, there is still judgement that religion-based school as exclusive in imparting students’ character. These phenomena become the main research background of this article.

Problem Statement

Characteristic education in religion-based is still assumed exclusive; in fact, those schools also used government curriculum which is “kurtilas”. This curriculum is putting forward to moral, a good behavior (akhlakul karimah) of students as a base of educational program success. For that reason, this article tries to review a program strategy of character building at religion-based school.

Research Questions

How the model of communication strategy IPPAR Model (Insight-Program Strategic-Program Implementation-Action and Reputation) be used to explain how program strategy of character building at religion-based school? This model is selected because there is still a society’s judgment that school image of religion-based is exclusive impressed in imparting a characteristic value. IPPAR model helps researcher in explaining a stage of characteristic educational program used, starting from situation analysis, determining goals, target, outcome program, implementation, and program evaluation. Research result with using this model is expected to provide a positive contribution related school image of religion-based as inclusive school; it means that it is the same with school in general and it opens for everyone who wants to study at that school.

Purpose of the Study

This study aims to understand the approach of educational institutions in applying character education to students. The aim is about program strategy of character building at religion-based school includes planning, implementing, and program evaluation of character education.

Research Methods

In this study, researchers used qualitative methods. Epistemologically qualitative research methods emphasized interview and observation procedures in data collection techniques. While the axiology was intended to get a picture of the object under study or reality that comes from field informants. The description and understanding of qualitative data would determine after conducting research. Meanwhile, to get a general picture of the reality that would be examined usually determined at the pre-research stage. The study used in this research was a case study, an in-depth study of phenomena in a real-life context. Case studies could be used for research in the form of planning, both regarding regional planning, general administration, general policy, management science, and education (Yin, 2008). In this study related to planning the application of student character education in schools. This phenomenon would be studied as well as the case study assumption that it was useful to understand a problem in depth. The interview technique was also used in this study. In this process the researcher intended to explore information by the way of question and answer between the researcher and the research resource directly. Literally the interview was a way to obtain in-depth information about a discussion raised by the researcher.

Findings

Before making a program, the initial step surely needs to be implemented is to design or make plans related to the program strategy. Program strategies include program planning, implementation, and evaluation (Cutlip et al., 2011). The program strategy was also applied at Daarut Tauhiid Vocational School and Santa Maria 2 High School as research locations. Based on observations and interviews, the character education program strategy implements the stages of the program's communication strategy including planning, implementing, and evaluating. This stage is relevant to the public relations program planning strategy, the IPPAR Model. This strategy includes Insight, Strategic Programs, Program Implementation, Action and Reputation as illustrated in Figure 2. The following is the scheme of the results of research on the planning of character education programs in faith-based schools using the IPPAR Model.

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Based on the research results, mention that in Daarut Tauhiid Vocational School and Santa Maria 2 Senior High School, implement making programs with reference to program planning. These results are relevant to the IPPAR Model communication strategy which emphasizes the Insight aspect, which means the initial stages in planning the program (Yayu et al., 2019). This stage is applied to make character education programs at schools. Insight aims to map the goals and objectives of the program. As for what is implemented by school, by collecting data through situation analysis. Data is collected secondary or take concepts related to the program, as well as primary data taken based on the Focus Group Discussion (FGD) activities with school stakeholders. Data collection techniques in making program planning through FGDs are intended to explain the situation of pre-research results or observations about the program to be designed (Sipayung & Purwanti, 2017). Related to this study, researchers conducted FGDs to explain to stakeholders about the application of character education at schools. Including explaining the importance of integrated character education between the school, family, and community environment.

The Insight results also explain the background to making a character education program. The school recognizes that the program was created to strengthen the quality of graduates so that students can grow and develop into individuals who are excellent in the field of character and academia. From these objectives the program targets are students in the Daarut Tauhiid Vocational School and Santa Maria 2 Senior High School.

The next stage is establishing the right program and in accordance with the results of the situation analysis at the insight or strategic program stage. This stage intends to determine the platform of the program including the theme of character education programs in schools, the form of the program, the type of program, the message platform program, and the cost of the program. In relation to the results of the study, it was found that Daarut Tauhiid Vocational School and Santa Maria 2 High School had similar programs in instilling student character. The theme of the program is character education by instilling good values in students. The activity consists of school manuals, bulletin boards, banners, and video screenings, films related to character education. Some of the programs have the same type, namely internal media produced by school. Internal media, according to public relations practitioners, is media created to socialize institutional policies (Hidayat et al., 2018). Likewise, the reason for this type of character education program is that it was acknowledged to have been initiated by the internal parties of school by taking into account the situation of students, parents' input, and stakeholders who had been consulted. The message platform delivered is that all students have quality characters so they can become excellent students. This message platform also addresses program objectives in the form of program outcomes.

Program Implementation is the last stage in the form of implementing a character education program (Hidayat et al., 2020). This stage pays attention to aspects of the process and it controls the implementation of character education programs in school environment and also outside of school environment. For example, the school manual program is distributed to all students as a guide as well as a control book or a link between parents of students and the school. The school manual consists of a column of student activity records at school and at home. The book also contains notes on student progress and a list of student teachers who can be contacted if parents need information. While wall magazine, banners are installed in each corner of the school using a variety of content. One of the banners in the cafeteria area written good person and honest person. Likewise, the wall magazine is filled with various religious activities and positive values are always instilled in students. For film media, it usually plays in schools integrated with student subjects. Films with values of honesty, discipline, politeness, mutual respect, are often screened as media for student learning. Audiovisual is the power of film as a mass media (Hidayat et al., 2019). Film media was chosen as one of the character education programs because the film was considered effective in conveying messages about characters. Students tend to like the audiovisual display because there are pictures that can attract students.

The implementation of character education programs so far has been effective. Informants acknowledged that each program was evaluated at least every semester. Evaluation is done openly by asking the opinions of parents and stakeholders. In addition, the evaluation is taken from the results of the control during the program. Likewise, the character education program in Daarut Tauhiid Vocational School and Santa Maria 2 High School accommodates opinions and evaluations of program implementation. Until now, the implementation of the program is considered good. The indicators are the attitudes and behaviors of students both at school and home. Through the student manual, school can summarize the development of student character. Each parent gives notes about student hygiene at home. The existence of external support proves that the image and reputation of the school can be managed well (Action and Reputation). Of course, the reputation as a school track record is evidenced by the award as a superior accredited school. This success is in line with the learning system and it graduates output which has superior student character qualities.

The character education program strategy is applied through two approaches namely 1) internal approach, and 2) external approach. The internal approach is in the form of internal media, including bulletin boards, banners, and film media. Internal media is intended as a means of socializing the values of character. Internal media is not only a means of information, but also a tool to provide understanding to students about character education. The socialization of character education is conducted by the two schools namely Daarut Tauhiid Vocational School and Santa Maria 2 High School is recognized as being able to build understanding of students towards character education. Internal media can be regarded as a communication function instrumental in the natural that there is purpose to inform, persuade, change understanding, attitudes, and change the behavior of students. Based on observations, the function is recognized to have been fulfilled by changes in student behavior that always implements positive values, such as getting up early, helping parents, being honest, polite, respecting the teacher, loving friends, and carrying out ford prayers and sunnah prayers. Technique of internal approach is through socialization media; besides that, it is through learning media in form of audio visual. For example, teacher provides watching session a movie together which is inside a moral contains a moral value. This technique is effective because students tend to prefer to visual message. It is the same with the research finding from the previous research, mentions that film, theatre, can be used as a way of imparting moral to students (Thambu et al., 2020). The external approach is through cooperation between school and parents. The form of school cooperation like preparing a system like control book of students’ activity during at home. The internal or external approach used in imparting characteristic education at religion-based school, the foundation also uses government curriculum applied at school in general which is “Kurtilas” curriculum. This step is conducted to eliminate exclusive impression in society. However, the difference with general school is additional program which is religion-based like reciting, practicing lectures, and praying in congregation. In addition, a system of controlling students’ activity at schools is also implemented, so that students’ good habits are continuous. The applied-approach is expected to be able to build an image and reputation which is religion-based schools have the same position as schools in general.

Conclusion

The character education program is formed by using two approaches, internal and external. Internal is a program designed and implemented at schools. While external is a character education program obtained by students in the home environment. Internal approaches include internal media programs and teacher modeling. Internal media consist of bulletin boards, banners, and film media as a learning tool for students in the classroom. The skills program is far more effective in instilling character values. Students claim that teacher's example is more emotionally motivated to behave and act according to what teacher exemplifies. In addition, modeling is recognized as opening a space for symmetrical communication.

The external approach is a character education program which is implemented at home environment. This program is a contact book between the homeroom teacher and parents. The contact book as a communication and control tool for students' attitudes and behavior while at home.

Character education programs through internal and external approaches are designed through the IPPAR Model program planning strategy. This strategy includes Insight, which describes the background of the program made on the results of a situation analysis. This analysis aims to map the goals and objectives of character education programs. The goal is to provide students with the purpose of information, the example of the positive values that can deliver students who are excellent in terms of character as well as academics. The next stage is to determine the program platform or strategic program including the theme, form, type, and message platform program. Themes about student character education with a program of guidebooks, bulletin boards, banners, and films. All types of programs are internal media, is media that are produced and managed by school institutions. The program is carried out by installing various internal media as a form of socialization on character education, including inserting films about character education at each class meeting. Internal media as a character education program is evaluated every semester. Evaluation is based on a process of controlling program implementation and suggestions from parents through a contact book. Character education programs are considered in line with the achievement of educational institutions that obtain superior accreditation. The achievement was obtained because of many factors, one of them are the output of graduates who are considered capable of producing students of superior character. This success is surely inseparable from the reputation which has always been managed by the Daarut Tauhiid Vocational School and Santa Maria 2 Senior High School.

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