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The Mission of Schools in Africa
| Article
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15119 |
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Section : |
CULTURE
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| Issue
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4 / 1989 |
3,924 Words |
| Author
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E.H.K. Nsubuga
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In literate societies the institution known as the school is charged with the specialized function of teaching certain things. Schools establish a sequence of potential experiences for the purpose of disciplining children and youth in accepted norms and group ways of thinking and acting. This process is known as formal education. Schools are charged with the provision of formal education so that graduated students can, as adults, conduct themselves correctly in their contacts in society in particular and the world in general. The mission of the schools in Africa is, therefore, a very important one.
Traditionally, the education of the African occurred in the home and local community, and prepared him for his domestic, village, and social responsibilities as an adult. The "school" in this sense was the home--representing in microcosm his tribe or society. Traditional forms of education in Africa varied from the simple instruction given from father to son among the Mosarwa of the Kalahari to the complex educational system of the highly organized and sophisticated Poro society of West Africa with its myriad ceremonies. The majority of traditional African societies fell somewhere between the two with respect to the educational arrangements they provided for their young, rituals offered to mark the end of puberty, and heavy reliance upon custom and example as the principal educational agents.
For young Africans, rites of passage marked the culmination of one epoch in life and the beginning of another. As children they had been introduced by their elders to the legends surrounding the previous exploits of their society, to the mysteries of their religion, to the practical aspects of hunting, farming, or raising cattle, and to their community responsibilities. With the completion of the rites; in others (when spontaneous reaction to the ceremony was itself considered an important part of the ritual), secrecy surrounded the event. A variety of formal observances, in addition to the experiences of daily living, impressed upon each youth his place in society: a society in which religion, politics, economics, and social relationships were invariably interwoven. Thus the education of the young in Africa was functional and relevant to the situation of the day.
The effective education provided by the African home was submerged, however, by the advent of Western education in Africa. During the colonial era in the latter years of the nineteenth century, foreign military forces were in occupation, European missionary stations were opened, foreign trading posts established, and a new (to Africa) type of education--Western education--was introduced. The colonial governments left the African educational program almost exclusively to the missionaries; while there were instances in which commercial interests offered a modicum of training for young Africans, the majority of schools were financed and operated by religious groups. Thus, the origins of Western education in Africa can be traced to those regions where the missionaries thought they could be most successful in the propagation of Christianity.
The mission schools provided a rudimentary and practical education. However, it soon became apparent that the development of educated indigenous leaders would require the quality of academic education provided in the metropolitan countries. Thus the schools started importing the standards and practices of formal education based on Western models. The goal of these missionary schools was to Christianize and "civilize" Africans
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