Islamic Higher Education in Indonesia

Islamic higher education in Indonesia has had a long history in the form of pondok pesantren, an institution of traditional Islamic scholarship derived from the Middle East but adapted locally as boarding schools of students, santri, under the tutelage of the kyai, learned man of Islam. Modern reformism since the turn of the century has created new Islamic educational institutions, madrasah, in which religious and secular subjects are combined. The State Institute of Islamic Religion (IAIN) is also a product of this reformism. There are 14 IAINs scattered all over the country with more than 2,000 staff members and more than 90,000 students and graduates. Efforts to up-grade the quality of the IAIN faculty by sending staff to Western universities for graduate degrees have been made for some time, and this has introduced a new liberal climate among the Muslim intellectuals.