education is , we will keep championing the cause of the school alone as an entity and we run a great risk of churning out very well schooled illiterates .
Our educational systems were designed for certification and for memory and not for imagination . The problem with this is that at the end of the day it won ' t really matter what the graduate can do as long as they have some form of certification . This is why we keep hearing over and over about the potential of Africa . That story is worn out . As a kid I heard about the potential of Africa and at least then we did see a few things but as I grew up action was replaced with more stories and rhetoric .
Think of this . You have an African University that has a civil engineering department but when it ' s time to build new structures in the university , the job is contracted to Chinese firms . Whichever way you look at it , there is a problem . It is either that the graduates lack the competencies required for the projects in which case you wonder what they were learning in school . The second scenario is that the authorities lack confidence in the people being churned out by the system which in my view is an even bigger problem . Why run programs that you lack confidence in ?
It may not look too bad when you look at it in isolation but when you contextualize it , then it takes a whole different meaning . I cannot in my wildest dreams imagine a building in China being built by an African contractor . When you look at it from that angle then you understand exactly how bad things are .
As long as certification remains at the center of the quest for education and not the ability to solve problems then we will continue in this downward trajectory for a long time . What then is the future ?
Well the future has already begun and to illustrate this permit me to cite a very interesting episode in the scriptures . Jesus told his disciples to become his witnesses in Jerusalem , Judea , Samaria and the uttermost parts of the world ( Acts 1:8 ). Well they stayed in Jerusalem perhaps because it was the place where they were most comfortable . Then in Acts 8:1 what happens ? Persecution arises and they are scattered from Jerusalem to Judea , Samaria and the uttermost parts of the world . The very places they were supposed to have gone voluntarily were the places
People who have tasted the comfort of remote learning are not likely to want to quickly return to a packed and boring classroom . Learning is taking place anywhere anytime . It is like having buffet style where the student has choices . This is what we are discovering every day at the Street University .
where they were forced to by persecution . Well , similarly , the very place we should have been looking at educationally years ago is the place that the Covid-19 pandemic forced us to go .
People who have tasted the comfort of remote learning are not likely to want to quickly return to a packed and boring classroom . Learning is taking place anywhere anytime . It is like having buffet style where the student has choices . This is what we are discovering every day at the Street University .
The examining bodies are also discovering that they limit themselves greatly ( and their revenue ) by making the school their sole trading partner . The result of this is that there will be a surge in independent registrations with examining bodies which will lead to a very interesting new pattern .
Remember that the key objective for the student is to pass the exam . The key objective is NOT to belong to a school . So , there will be a rise in independent students who will register with examining bodies and who will be free to select their teachers from different online platforms . So a student will be able to pick different teachers for different subjects and even within the subject will be able to pick different teachers for different topics . Learners will gravitate towards teachers that make the connection with them . This is already playing out online .
This form of liberalization will actually increase the quality of education because now the teachers will be rated by the students and not the system . So , teachers that connect with learners will be rewarded directly while those who do not will suffer consequences .
Another development from this scenario is that learners will not be forced to learn at the pace dictated to them by society .
They will learn at their own pace . Because the system has sentenced people to spend colossal amounts of time conforming , many are actually impaired by the very system that is supposed to help them maximize their potential .
I went from primary through secondary to tertiary education . I graduated with a first degree in social statistics . However when I got out of university I discovered just like every other graduate discovered at the time that we were going nowhere without computer literacy . The cities were filled with computer colleges where many of us paid money to attend . Today , computer colleges are obsolete and the generation of today grew up on the computer . Yet , they still have to undergo an educational calendar according to a time frame and schedule determined by a largely obsolete system . Things that can be learnt in five years are taking sixteen years because people are forced to conform .
The truth is that today ' s educational system does not favor the brilliant and that is why more and more brilliant people will opt to dump the system and create their own future . The greatest irony is that when they succeed , they are then given honorary doctorate degrees by the same systems that they dumped .
We proudly invite you to become a member of the Street University ( www . thestreetuniversity . com ). Let us build ourselves up to build our continent .
Dr . Wale Akinyemi is the Chief Transformation Officer , PowerTalks Corporate & Personal Development Consultants . He is a seasoned coach , mentor and writer . You can commune with him on this or related matters via email at : Wale @ powertalks . biz .