Africa's Heath and Education | Page 43

Education wiro deliberations . Six months of ongoing reflection about what it is that we call education . For a Rwandan to be considered educated , what should they know ? That ’ s a question that would take about six months to answer .” The aim of the deliberations would be to repurpose our education around a set of values it ought to internalize in our young people and thereafter reproduced in society .
I also noted that it would be my hope that after those deliberations , our society will have “ defined education as a security concern , it will be placed under the security sector . Not because it understands education better but because it is most organized . A province education officer who reports to a division commander .” On the part of the division commander or regional police commander is about the institutional credibility and clarity of purpose they bring , rather than any notion of coercion , on the part of the army and the police .
I further proposed that “ Focus all education resources on building a strong primary school system . Stop secondary school specialization and impart broad knowledge including soft skills like empathy . End glorified high schools masquerading as universities .”
A primary education steeped in an integrity-based curriculum would be complimented with a secondary education introducing key texts . It would introduce basics of research and discovery undergirded by a “ foundational curriculum ” consisting of courses on key African thinkers , Cheikh Anta Diop , Kwame Nkrumah ,
Dani Nabudere , Samir Amin , and the like . University curriculum would therefore branch students into their specialized fields having been appropriately rooted . The final year is mandatory community service in key sectors : agriculture , education , health . Candidate graduates would add to the corps of agriculture extensionists , teachers , community health workers , and demonstrate through reflection – in the form of a thesis – the relationship between the academics and the lived experience in the community .
Where will the funding come from ? I noted , “ This proposal for our education system overhaul will cut our education sector budget by at least 70 %. It means we can actually fund it ourselves if donors say that they won ’ t fund an education system that ’ s under the security sector .”
It is without question that the cradle of the post genocide efforts noted above is the country ’ s security sector . It stopped the genocide and from that moral basis if pursued social change . The army – and later the police – has been the fulcrum of the rebirth of the New Rwanda . The success of the armed forces is that as far back as 1991 they were able to articulate their purpose as the cradle of Rwanda ’ s progress . A youthful army commander told his fellow youths that they might as well give up on their cause if they are unable to conceive themselves as the cornerstone of the nation “ Ili jeshi litakua msingi wa inci yetu !”
If education is about imparting a set of values , then It is as if the army has had its own education . Its philosophy , known as the doctrine , is not written anywhere but all know not to violate it : a doctrinal transgression is the red line in the armed forces .
Similarly , an education system imparts a set of values that guide members of society on what they can expect from each other , how to build trust and reciprocity ; it ’ s how minds of young people are framed and how they internalize systems of self-governance : how they can be themselves in a society and how they conceive relations between the individuals and society ; this is the value system that moderates society and expectations get predictable ; it is how social change gets institutionalised .
I suspect that the doctrine means having answers to these basic tenets : this is who we are , this is where we are , this is where we want to go , and we are doing it our way . As a result , a soldier who has command of the doctrine is self-aware and is not easily subjected to manipulation . The armed forces are cultivating human beings with a sense of mission in life ; a sense of honor ; a sense of what they want to accomplish .
This is drastically different from our education systems that are formulating training manuals and referring to them as education , unable to craft a societal doctrine . This is the fatal mistake that post-colonial Africa is yet to overcome . The suggestion is that our education system has much to learn from the armed forces , at least for Rwanda ’ s context .

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