Presented as part of the School of Demography seminar series

As a country that currently focus on accelerating its human capital development, Indonesia faces challenges in regards to imbalanced distribution of its highly-educated population across regions. Since the highly-educated population are considered as essential capital in driving regional growth, migration by university entrants and university graduates, in particular, plays a vital role in cross-region development inequality. The intensity of higher education-related migration in Indonesia has been increased in recent decades, and it is an unavoidable phenomenon partly due to the fact that the availability and accessibility of higher educational institutions (HEIs), albeit their outgrown quantities, still vary across areas within the country. Despite extensive academic discussions on the issue of migration in human capital context, there has been a dearth of research on the spatial dynamics of educated youths and their relation to life-course transitions. By analysing data from Indonesia’s censuses and national surveys, this research aims to provide a more nuanced understanding on (1) spatial patterns of higher education-related youth migration; (2) the relationship between life-course transitions of educated young adults and their migration trajectories; and (3) the magnitude of student and graduate migration in the context of human capital redistribution.

Ayumi Malamassam is a PhD candidate in School of Demography, Australian National University. Prior to her study, she has worked as a researcher at Research Center for Population, Indonesian Institute of Sciences (LIPI) since 2008. Her main research interests focused on population mobility and regional development. Ayumi received a Bachelor of Science in Geography from Gadjah Mada University and graduated from Australian National University with a Master degree in Social Research.