Floranesia Lantang hopes to bring the skills she is learning as part of her Masters of National Security Policy to her passion for community development and border security in her native Papua province.
"This degree has some very practical courses that I think will help me to contribute to Indonesia’s national security in the future,” Floranesia says. “Especially because our president wants Indonesia to be a global maritime fulcrum. The content is very relevant to our situation in the region.”
As part of her Bachelor in International Relations at Padjadjaran University, Floranesia wrote a thesis about border management between Indonesia’s Papua Province and Papua New Guinea from a societal security perspective. She also assisted in a project commissioned by the Ministry of Political, Security and Legal Affairs with the ASEAN Study Center at the university on management of the Indonesian border.
“Government agencies and ministries have overlapping policies, and they do not sufficiently consider societal security, local traditions and local values among the Indigenous people,” she says. “So I proposed integrated border management,”like what the European Union uses, so that the two countries would apply one, single border agency and one-stop border posts.”
It was one of her lecturers who recommended the NSC to Floranesia. While she waited on the outcome of her scholarship application to the Lembaga Pengelola Dana Pandidikan (Indonesia Endowment Fund for Education), she returned to Papua to expand the work of the non-profit community development organization she founded: Education for Papua.
Floranesia has found studying at the NSC challenging, but rewarding. She was especially encouraged to be able to develop a specific policy for the Indonesian Government, “I’m developing a policy proposal for Indonesia’s global maritime fulcrum focusing on long term policy goals – because now we just have short term goals.” she says.
Floranesia’s desire to work for the development of her homeland shines trhough. “I’m applying for a job in the public service as an analyst of human rights issues, but also I think I will apply to no- government organisations like World Vision or UNICEF in Papua becauase it’s my mission to contribute to the education and development of society,” she says.
“What I’ve learned at NSC from assessments materials is how to make a very well-structured plan for the short and long terms, and how to apply theory and concepts to particular issues.”
“After going back to Indonesia I can put the theories, concepts and skills I learned here into practice.”
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