A Very Late Partial English Immersion Program an Alternative Program for Indonesian University

This paper is focused on the establishment and improvement of an immersion program at Indonesian tertiary level of education. Considering internal and external factors such as economy, socio-culture, and politics, it is argued that such a program is needed. Beginning with the rationale of bilingual education program, the discussion will continue on the current situation as the background, the issues and implications, the proposal, and the possible implementation plan of an immersion program.English is proposed as the target language in the program considering its being the language of knowledge, the language of global job markets, the language of information and technology dissemination, and the language of politics and socio-culture around the globe. However, due to several contextual reason, among which are the government policy and resource availability, the application cannot be in the form of a full immersion program. These considerations play important roles in determining the feasibility and the implementation of the program. Adjusting to the situation and local context, the application is proposed to be a very late partial English immersion program