Source : Ihsan C. K. Sinuraya (Civil Engineering '21)
Renovation of UMS Student House (Griya Mahasiswa) that initiated by Muhammadiyah University of Surakarta (UMS) that placed at the area of Campus 1 was started with chaos (12/04) experienced by Student Activity Units (UKM). Before pointing to the problem that faced by the students, let us explain what is Griya Mahasiswa. Griya Mahasiswa was built in the past years ago for sake of fulfilling the student needs about activity outside primary courses, started to used back in 70s and until January 2022 there are 14 UKM settled here.
Griya Mahasiswa consists of Student Government secretariat and also various UKM’s from various sectors, which LPM Campus is one of them. The fact that this place quite old and need to be renovated, UMS was initiated to renovate this place in the internal meeting from November of 2021. Generally, renovation of a building especially mass use place was begun with removing old building part such as wall, roof, frame, floor, etc or the whole building itself that known as “Site Cleaning” or simply demolition then start to add new part or rebuilt whole building with new design to meet the user needs and owner budget.
We have tried to reach Dr. Ihwan Susila as Vice-Rector III that responsibly related to this topic. He said that the information about demolition and renovation was already informed (red: released) by Student Bureau 2 months before the site cleaning day. He gave his opinion about this renovation project as a form of increasing the existence and achievements of UMS students. The renovation of the student housing is an effort by the UMS student body to represent a university with superior accreditation.
“The condition of the building is no longer suitable for student activities, which has been around for a long time. There are a lot of damages here and there and the place is no longer suitable to compensate for the large number of existing UKM’s, so we need to renovate and build a student secretariat that is more representative and reflects UMS which is now accredited as superior. This is a long-term plan to build an UKM secretariat building at UMS which is expected to increase the existence and achievement of students," explained Ihwan Susila regarding the basics and objectives of building student houses.
Source : Ihsan C. K. Sinuraya (Civil Engineering '21)
The Griya Mahasiswa Renovation Project was started in April 2022, after UKM finished relocating its assets to a place that had been prepared by the student bureau. The renovation project has been started with site preparation, in which the previous student housing building had to be cleaned and demolished, then the new construction would be carried out after Eid 2022. This renovation takes about ten months from the contract agreed with the contractor. Technically, there are two contractors that have been agreed with UMS, the first contractor to clean (preparation of the site) and the second to build the building.
"We will start construction after Eid later, although the date has been determined before Eid because there are some things that are usually technical - craftsmen and so on - maybe later after Eid they have started to build. And this takes about ten months from planning the contract that was agreed yesterday,” Ihwan Susila said.
The existence of this renovation and development project certainly has various impacts, one of which was UKM-U friends who felt that the transfer of assets to the temporary relocation site was too sudden. In March 2022, there were a lot of UKM's who rescued their respective assets to the temporary secretariat, including the ex-BAA UMS, Ramayana on Jalan Wahidin Solo, and near the hospital being built by UMS on Jalan Adisucipto.
All of the plan that already prepared before was being realised by demolition that took place from April 12nd of 2022. Demolition of old Griya Mahasiswa was not run smoothly. Some UKM admitted that they did not get any informations about this demolition and they did not prepare well to do this. There were several UKM assets that was damaged during the demolition of the land because they had not finished packing and moving the assets. Students themselves regretted that existing assets were damaged due to demolition at the location even though this had been planned for a long time in coordination between student bureau and UKM. Basically, the assets in UKM are owned by UMS and managed by every UKM so that when there is damage to assets, of course it is a loss for the University. Even so, student bureau did not aim to blame UKM friends.
“...of course, we don't need to blame, but I have conveyed the process many times, we have coordinated with the student bureau so that all assets can be saved," Ihwan Susila added. Development in the campus environment often creates pros and cons. Positively, the result of this renovation is to improve the quality of comfort for student activities in general and UKM friends in particular. Negatively, this project will certainly hamper the activities of SMEs in the future during the 2022 term of service.
Of course, we are waiting for the results of the renovation of this student house, hopefully the new place will be able to support students to develop further, of course in order to achieve student achievement. Then for UKM’s, this new place would be a second home in the context of designing and evaluating programs. Hopefully, with the successful construction of the renovation of the student residence, they will be able to become an important part of UMS' journey towards World Class University
From trouble that faced by UKM and information from Campus Internals, it can be known that there was big problem as the beginning of chaos that occured on Griya Mahasiswa on demolition day. Where the information was released by Student Bureau it needed to pass through many hands before reaching UKM that mainly using this place. This was revealing a fact that internal communication between one and each other was ineffective, and it should be updated.
Writer : Ihsan C. K. Sinuraya (Civil Engineering '21), Kenya Nurrin Khasannah (Civil Engineering' 21) and Amarta S. Wijaya (Accounting'19)
Editor : Ayu Ukhti Muslimah (English Education'19) and Thifa Nabilla Jazaufi (Pharmacy'19)
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