The Ministry of Education, Culture, Research, and Technology (Kemendikbudristek), through the Center for Financing Services (Puslapdik), reports that the planned recipients of the Indonesia Pintar Program (PIP) assistance will reach 18.6 million students in 2024.
Nadiem Makarim, Minister of Kemendikbudristek, stated that the target number of PIP recipients this year is higher than last year's 17.9 million students.
"This year, Kemendikbudristek is increasing the target for upper secondary education (SMA) by 567,531 students and for vocational high schools (SMK) by 99,104 students," said Nadiem in his official statement on Tuesday (23/1/2024).
Nadiem also detailed that the government will provide PIP assistance for elementary school (SD) students of Rp450,000 per recipient per year and for junior high school (SMP) students of Rp750,000 per recipient per year.
Meanwhile, students in upper secondary education (SMA/SMK) will receive PIP of Rp1.8 million per recipient per year.
In addition, President Joko Widodo (Jokowi) stated that the PIP assistance aims to meet the various needs of students at school.
“Through this PIP assistance, I hope that students will be more enthusiastic about learning and want to continue their education to a higher level,” said President Jokowi on the same occasion.
According to him, SMA and SMK students who wish to continue their education to higher education also have the opportunity to receive further educational assistance in the form of the Indonesia Pintar Card (KIP) Kuliah.
Meanwhile, the Head of Puslapdik, Abdul Kahar, explained that the target recipients of PIP are sourced from three data sets: the Integrated Social Welfare Data (DTKS) which has been verified by the Ministry of Social Affairs (Kemensos).
This data is then matched with the Basic Education Data (Dapodik) to verify the student's status at school.
Furthermore, Puslapdik has also matched the Data on Targeting the Elimination of Extreme Poverty (P3KE) obtained from the National Population and Family Planning Agency (BKKBN) since 2023.
"With the P3KE data, it is hoped that the accuracy of PIP assistance targeting will be better," said Abdul.
(See also: Education Budget Increases in the 2024 State Budget, Reaching a New Record)