A vocational high school established in the compounds of an industrial park, the first of its kind in Indonesia, is catering to Japanese corporate needs for manpower at a time graduates from other vocational schools are more likely to fail to land a job than those from regular high schools and colleges.
"I had no trouble in adapting to technologies in my workplace," said Diki Apandi, 20, one of the 2016 graduates from SMK Mitra Industri MM2100 and now a motorcycle engineer at PT Astra Honda Motor. "I learned most of them in SMK Mitra."
Astra Honda is located in MM2100 Industrial Town in Bekasi, West Java province, east of Jakarta. Japanese affiliates account for around 70 percent of the 189 tenants in the industrial park.