Character Building Program in Shaping The Independence and Social Care of Students

Abstract

The weakening of the character of the younger generation, especially in the aspects of independence and social concern, is an important problem in the world of education. Although pesantren is known as a conducive environment for character formation, there is still a gap between the understanding of values and their implementation in the lives of students. This study aims to: (1) analyze the implementation of the character building program; (2) identify supporting and inhibiting factors; and (3) describe the program achievements at the Imam An-Nawawi Islamic Boarding School in Banda Aceh. This study uses a descriptive qualitative approach. The results of the study show that the character development program is implemented in an integrated manner through five approaches, namely the learning of manners based on the book of Minhajul Muslim, habituation of daily activities, educator examples, continuous supervision, and evaluation through character report cards. The achievement of social care is relatively high (±80%) with the dominance of the cultural category (60.94%), while independence is in the medium category (±60%) with the value of cultivating (51.56%). Supporting factors include the role model of educators, religious environment, structured programs, good management, and synergy with families. The inhibiting factors include lack of communication with parents, low self-awareness of students, dense activities, the influence of digital media, and inconsistency of educators. This study emphasizes that the effectiveness of character education depends on the suitability of program design and environmental engineering that encourages consistent independent practices.