What education can't do, and why children want to burn it

What you need to know:

  • We are creating two Kenyas, the educated and the uneducated one, the arsonist versus the bookworms, the failures versus the successful, the public against the private.
  • Perhaps those burning schools are just behaving like those MCAs or MPs who are trying to push back the forthcoming elections.
  • Teachers who wanted a headmaster to be fired only needed to incite students to burn the schools.

Kenyans have sold land, cows, goats and houses for education.  Anything, to get their children educated. We had a burning desire for education, once.

In the last few weeks, our grammar has got jumbled up. Sadly, in this case, the order of the words does affect the product, which now reads, “Kenyans have a desire for burning education”.

Education CS Fred Matiang'i has told the Senate Education committee that there have been more than 300 cases of school arson attacks since 2007.

More than 130 cases have occurred this year, with around 113 of them in the last three weeks. Every so often, I receive burn updates through WhatsApp.

This is sad and deeply distressing. We are creating two Kenyas, the educated and the uneducated one, the arsonist versus the bookworms, the failures versus the successful, the public against the private. These will be the neo-tribes of the future.

The ‘burning’ excuses are as many as the ones we hear from older generations when they throw stones and tantrums: we want holidays, we are tired, and exam-cheating loopholes have been sealed so we don’t know how we will pass KCSE this year.

TOO LATE

Education is burning and with it our burning desire for it, yet we still ask ourselves why?

Perhaps those burning schools are just behaving like those MCAs or MPs who are trying to push back the forthcoming elections hoping to get in a few extra salaries and complete the looting they started when they bypassed the Salaries and Remunerations Commission.

Maybe they are like those public servants who lose their senses at the smell of currency, no matter how small its denomination.

Possibly, they are behaving like those parents who paid bribes to get exam questions, like those absent fathers who spend their lives in a bar, only to come home to cause pandemonium.

They wake up one day, too late, to realise that their daughters have grown up fast, and they are pregnant. They beat the girl, hate the boy and are ashamed of the baby, when all they really need is a mirror to hit and to hate.

They may as well behave like those drunken teachers who stumble right and left as they enter the classroom, trying to find some balance on what seems to be a moving floor.

These youngsters know the police will not do anything to them. Policemen, they think, are busy killing each other as well as their own lawyers. In their free time, they dedicate themselves wholeheartedly to the art of collecting informal revenue from the guilty and innocent alike.

In the education sector, I have been witness to amazing acts of sacrifice from good and responsible parents, teachers, students and mentors.

We have amazing youth in this country. Engaging, exceedingly clever, talented, gifted and beautiful.  Every time I enter my first year law class to teach, I feel great relief, like in an oasis.

I see the future of this country compressed in their ideas, expressed in their wide and swallowing eyes. Their questions are always challenging, free and deep.

SOCIAL FAILURE

Who is turning our youth into arsonists? Is this a concerted effort sponsored by cartels of corrupt teachers? Trade unions? Or are these just fortuitous, unfortunate events?

Ninety-nine percent of the incidents have taken place at public institutions. If the reason behind the arson could be pinpointed to the prolonged term or the sealed exam leaks or simply rowdy youth, then we would have a more or less similar proportion of private schools burning.

The problem is more public than private. Perhaps parents who send their kids to private schools are more committed to education, more demanding, and feel the pinch of their sacrifice.

Maybe children feel the pinch too.

The fact is, if the fires were due to exam leakage, reduced holidays or teacher-pupil exhaustion only, we would have an commensurate numbers of private and public schools burning. So, what’s the matter?

The principal of a reputable public school recently told me that there are three major factors in this sad, crazy burning frenzy.

First, parenting in Kenya is failing. Parents ship children to boarding school for the school to bring up, and they end up with practically no character or values. This approach reduces parenting to simply providing; a type of providing that does not include affection, example or spiritual support, but simply money.

For most parents, and particularly fathers, being a good parent means putting food on the table and paying school fees. In addition, well-to-do fathers will provide a few expensive holidays, toys and even a fancy car for post 18-year-old children. 

Second, the education system is totally warped. The aim is to pass, concentrating only on passing KCSE and not on educating. Passing is associated with success and our system was engineered to create professors . Whoever did not make it was a social failure until proven otherwise.

Third, people are in panic mode as loopholes for leakage are sealed. And fourth, CS Matiang’i set a bad precedent when he fired the headmasters whose schools were set on fire. Teachers who want a headmaster to be fired need only incite students to burn schools.

REFRAIN FROM FORCING

The first, second and third factors could explain part of the problem, But they do not put in plain words why only public schools are burning. The fourth factor could give us a good hint.

Teachers, in cahoots with parents and bodaboda operators, incite students to burn the school and get rid of the headmaster. However, this factor cannot stand alone.

We may also need to look at headmasters interested in erasing evidence, cartels avenging the changes introduced in accounting systems, and students on irrational rampage, triggered by the first three factors we mentioned above.

All the factors have bits and pieces of truth, but we should not miss the most important element: parenting, a responsibility many men and women have abdicated for comfort, laziness or ignorance. This is a cause for great concern.

I am told by a friend that in the spirit of consensus building with students, teachers should be requested to refrain from forcing the students on anything and are advised to ask the student their views like this:

"The government says the opening date for next term is August 6. Will you return then or do you want to remain home a while longer?" "Do you want to do exams, or should the teachers do them for you?" "Will you have porridge, or share sandwiches and tea with teachers in the staff room?"

It is worrying that impunity in now trickling down to younger and younger generations. Soon we could be witnessing fires in primary schools with horror, and we will still ask ourselves why. As if we did not know.

Dr Franceschi is the dean of Strathmore Law School. [email protected], Twitter: @lgfranceschi