General Director of Teachers and Education Personnel (Dirjen GTK) Ministry of Education, Culture, Research and Technology of Indonesia, Dr. Iwan Syahril, Ph.D observed the implementation of the Online Profesional Teacher Program selection at UNY Building. UNY Rector, Prof. Sumaryanto welcomed the visit on Sunday, April 24, 2022.

In this monitoring, Iwan Syahril asked several questions about the PPG selection test process, including the difficulties experienced by both participants and the committee. According to the IT Coordinator of UNY, Dr. Restu Widiatmono, the biggest obstacle in this exam is the participant's device, especially the internet connection. "We used 16 servers in this exam, eight units at UNY and eight units at UNNES, which were sufficient to accommodate 20,000 participants," said Restu Widiatmono.

Iwan Syahril said that PPG is a solution to fulfill teacher formation vacancies in special areas such as Halmahera, South Central Timor, Barito, Nias, Maluku, Sangihe Islands, and Tanimbar Islands. To ensure the quality of teachers who teach in special areas, each participant must have a good mastery of the subject matter. This point follows the government's focus on encouraging the learning process with problem-based and project-based learning approaches. Participants who pass this selection will participate in PPG for one year and assignments in special areas for two years. Each participant who completes this program can continue to teach in a specialized area or move to another area.

The selection test in Phase I took place from April 9 to 24, divided into five periods, and held at the PPG Building, Language Service Unit, and UPT ICT of UNY. For each session, UNY has 135 supervisors. Each supervisor monitored 20 people. All test activities were controlled from the control room in the PPG UNY Building, which could monitor the names of participants, school origin, education office, district, and the province of origin. The PPG Phase II Selection Test is planned to be held in June 2022, with approximately 350,000 teachers participating. The selection test is one of UNY's efforts in the sustainable development agenda to improve quality education and mutual partnerships between government and UNY. (Dedy, Tj. Lak)