Disgraceful African Education System
by Most of the African countries flooded with poverty have the same kind of system of education. Something worth noting. The setup of Primary school, Secondary school and then the Tertiary education which could be University education or College education is common. After a deep analysis of this setup, It is clear that this kind of system is not only uniform in most of the African countries but it has been used for decades without being revised to suit the demands of the new generation of children walking through it.
Several things I feel may need redressing in the system; Primary Education in most of the African countries run for seven or eight years before which an added two or three years in the preschool level is inevitable. In total a child spends about eleven years going through primary school education. Given that most of the African children only join school at the age of three, this will mean that the child is only through with the primary education at the age of fourteen years.
The secondary education, also known as high school education in different countries in Africa, runs for four or five years. Most of the countries have abolished the existence of the sixth form that was common in the 1980s. A student of fourteen years has to go through the five years. Only at the age of nineteen does the child finally get through the second stage of this education system.
Tertiary education is not standardize thankfully, most of the time that student who is at this level considered an adult yet depending on in parents for upkeep will have to go through at least two years of tertiary education to qualify the “job seeker” status of a lowest level. Is that fate or what? The twenty one year old young man or woman is still a dependant of his parents. If he is lucky enough he may be the only child of his parents making the burden lighter. But knowing Africa too well and only being one of them, a lastborn in a family of six siblings, what can I say? Being an only child must be as a result of misfortune where other siblings have passed on or impotency of one parent. That is Africa.
Now going back to the wound, the poverty well of African countries; I have asked myself time and again, why do we have to wait until our children turn twenty one to start thinking of empowering them to have independence of running their own lives? By the way, even at twenty one only about ten percent of those children can actually get their desired jobs or even start up businesses. Most of those who have managed to start up at a lower age have either come from families that knew how to manipulate the system or have rebelled and joined the music industry which for a long time had been considered a “no-go-zone” for a child deemed to be compliant!
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