TEMPO Interactive, Jakarta:The recent teacher competency tests carried out in some areas were a disaster. The program that was supposed to give indications on the general quality of teachers was executed haphazardly - far from professional standards. The Ministry of Education should have take into account a variety of technical issues, things that make a mess out of competency tests. The committee should have anticipated and taken care in advance of simple things such as Internet connection, especially since it was the first time the exam was carried out online. Did they, for example, not anticipate the load on the connection when the test booklet was accessed simultaneously? Was that why the connection failed in the middle of the test? With regard to the test participant data, what could have caused the differences? And the test questions, could they not have been prepared better? There were pictures in poor quality, there were questions without correct answer choices, and there were even questions that did not have anything to do with the competencies being tested. The government seemed unprepared. The Minister of Education and Culture Decree No. 57 of 2012 on Teacher Competency Tests was not issued until after the handbook on the implementation of the competency test had been distributed to various regions. The regulation that was supposed to be the legal foundation for test was not issued until July 26, four days before the test. It is not surprising that the Ministry of Education could not do its best to disseminate information on this program. This factor triggered widespread rejections against the test by teacher organizations since last month. Educators who oppose this program were concerned that the competency test could affect the allowance that they had been receiving. These negative reactions could have been prevented if only there been dialog between ministry officials and teachers. Ministry of Education officials should conduct a proper evaluation of what had gone so wrong. There is no point blaming other people, such as operators, calling them incompetent at installing the competency test programs. Education Minister Mohammad Nuh and his staff should use the time between now and early October, to finalize the preparations for the second group of test participants. Do not abort midway this program that has used up the state budget. If the information dissemination process and the competency test implementation had been handled better, surely not that many teachers would have objected, especially since it has been mandated by Law No. 14 of 2005 on Teachers and Lecturers, which stipulates that competency tests, certifications, and qualifications of professional educators should be finished in 2015. The teacher competency test is clearly critical because the results will in the future be used as benchmarks for determining the starting point for improving teacher performance. Alas, this noble goal will be difficult to achieve if the Ministry of Education does not clean up its act. ****