At the start of 2022, ACICIS welcomed eight students on our first ever Virtual Creative Arts and Design Professional Practicum (CADPP) program! These students came from three Australian universities: RMIT University, The Australia National University and The University of New South Wales. Seven of these students completed the virtual program with the $3000 New Colombo Plan mobility grant.
Dr IGAK Satrya Wibawa was the CADPP Academic Program Officer (APO) and Fauzan Adinugraha helped to design the program. This included designing the seminar topics, deciding on the field trip destinations and also mapping the students to their Host Organisations. Shortly before the program started, Dr Elly Kent reprised her role as the Academic Program Officer for the pilot CADPP program. Together with the assistance from the in-country ACICIS staff, Dr Elly managed the academic and placement component of the CADPP program. This included moderating the seminar and field trips, leading the discussion in the tutorial sessions, meeting with the mentors from each Host Organisation and giving the students academic and industry-related feedback and advice.
The CADPP was a six-week program which consisted of a combined timetable of seminars, field trips, language classes, and a professional placement. For the first five weeks, our students usually spent the morning in language classes, seminars or field trips and then undertook their part-time placement with their Host Organisation in the afternoons. In the last week of the program, students attended their placements full-time.
For five weeks, our students learned Bahasa Indonesia with Pusat Pengajaran Bahasa (PPB) at Atma Jaya University. The language classes were designed to help the students understand the basics of Bahasa Indonesia and Indonesian culture to help them interact with their mentor and colleagues at their placement.
To further prepare the students for their placement, ACICIS prepared a seminar series to introduce them to the industry. The topics varied from Introduction to Indonesia and Covid-19 to Introduction to Artistic Practices and Commercial Design in Indonesia. The seminar speakers came from various backgrounds such as artists, university professors, and other practitioners in the creative industry. One of the highlights was the Reflecting on Social Issues in Indonesia Through Creative Art and Journalism seminar which was shared with the Journalism students. Hans Nicholas, a journalist at Mongabay, and Gus Dark, a Bali based artist, successfully introduced the students to the industry’s way of reporting and reflecting on social issues in Indonesia.
To complete the experience, ACICIS also prepared two virtual fieldtrips to two different institutions. The first was to the Papermoon Puppet Theatre Studio in Yogyakarta. During the fieldtrip, the students got to watch a screening of KACA CAKA, a 30 minute play about a boy and his world of imagination whenever he saw a mirror. After watching the performance, students went of a virtual studio tour where they got a glimpse into how the puppets worked, their design process and the techniques the puppeteers use in performances. The second fieldtrip was to Yogyatorium Creative Space and Community Hub where the students learned about the brand ‘Dagadu’ as well as about the activities and other businesses inside the facility. At the end of the tour, the students were assigned a task to create a social media post about their trip to Yogyatorium.
In addition to the academic content, the students also had the chance to learn more about the Indonesian culture by joining a cultural activity prepared by ACICIS and our partner universities. Most of our CADPP students joined a two hour class of Batik Drawing by Sanata Dharma University or Wayang class by Desa Timun. The students learned how to draw traditional art and kept it as a souvenir. The students also got the chance to watch a documentary following the life of three street musicians in Jakarta titled, ‘Jalanan.’ After the screening, students had the unique opportunity to chat with the director and producer of the film, Daniel Ziv.
The main component of this program is the professional placement. ACICIS partnered with host organisations across Indonesia with various focuses including boutique & retail design, voiceover production, digital marketing, and museum. The six organisations hosting our first Virtual CADPP students included: Damn! I love Indonesia, IndoVoiceover, QWork, Museum Rudana, Great Digital Media and Okusi. The student’s placement tasks and projects included: designing graphics for clothing items, graphic design for campaigns, and social media posts and plans.
The program concluded with an online closing ceremony and program evaluation. The CADPP APO and Program Assistant held an interactive session to reflect on the personal bonding built between each other regardless of the geographical distances and the time differences. We would like to thank all of the Virtual CADPP Summer 2022 cohort, host organisations, host university, and speakers who contributed to the success of our first Virtual iteration of the CADPP program.
We wish everyone all the best for the future, and we look forward to seeing all the students in person in Indonesia soon!