LECTURE NOTES

EDUCATION AND DEVELOPMENT

WHAT IS EDUCATION?Students to give their conception and understandingof education.

Education is that which is supposed to give therecipient an intelligent approach to life, a searchfor truth, a sound sense of judgement, anappreciation of beauty, rhythm and order (anawakening of an aesthetic sense), a deep concernfor the welfare of humanity, a great sense ofresponsibility coupled with sincere devotion towork in the service of one’s country. Education in its broadest sense is any act orexperience that has a formative effect on the mind,character or physical ability of an individual. Inits technical sense education is the process bywhich society deliberately transmits itsaccumulated knowledge, skills and values from onegeneration to another.

On the other hand being educated may also bedescribed as knowing your own ignorance andbeginning the journey to knowledge of the unknown.But when does this journey begin and when does itend?

According to Jomo Kenyatta in FACING MOUNT KENYA,(Jomo Kenyatta, Foundation, Nairobi, 1972), thejourney begins at birth and ends with death. It

should therefore be recurrent. That is why Tuijumanin RECURRENT EDUCATION AND SOCIAL ECONOMIC SUCCESS(Institute of International Education, Universityof Stockholm, Stockholm, 1986) calls it structuredlearning from cradle to grave. By now we should nothave any doubt as to what education is. It is alearning process. This learning process must passon survival skills to individual members of anysociety. It is those skills, which will in turnlead to development.Education is meant to be for sustainabledevelopment by helping people to develop theattitudes, skills and knowledge to make informeddecisions for the benefit of themselves and others,now and in the future, and to act upon thesedecisions.Sustainable development is seeking to meet theneeds of the present without compromising those offuture generations. We have to learn our way out ofcurrent social and environmental problems and learnto live sustainably. Sustainable development is avision of development that encompasses populations,animal and plant species, ecosystems, naturalresources and that integrates concerns such as thefight against poverty, gender equality, humanrights, education for all, health, human security,intercultural dialogue, etc.

However, despite hundreds of years of exposure tothe white man’s education, Africa’s situation ispathetic. This is largely because of wrongapproaches to education. There have been twodomineering theories or approaches to education;

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1. MODERNIZATION THEORYThis theory stands on the premise that a societycan be functionally restructured and brought to alevel of another considered to be higher on thedevelopment scale.

2. HUMAN CAPITAL INVESTMENT THEORYThe theory looks at education as an investment inhuman beings by spending resources on them to teachthem knowledge, skills, technologies, values andnorms that are considered to be able to bring abouteconomic development. It has been argued that high rates of education areessential for countries to be able to achieve highlevels of economic growth. Empirical analyses tendto support the theoretical prediction that poorcountries should grow faster than rich countriesbecause they can adopt cutting edge technologiesalready tried and tested by rich countries.However, technology transfer requires knowledgeablemanagers and engineers who are able to operate newmachines or production practices borrowed from theleader in order to close the gap through imitation.Therefore, a country's ability to learn from theleader is a function of its stock of "humancapital." Recent studies of the determinants ofaggregate economic growth have stressed theimportance of fundamental economic institutions andthe role of cognitive skills provided througheducation.

At the individual level, there is a largeliterature, generally related back in time on howearnings are related to the schooling and other

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human capital of the individual. But there is a bigchief controversies revolving around how tointerpret the impact of schooling on our society.

However, in pursuit of development, third worldcountries have invested heavily in education andhave sung the modernization song for timeimmemorial but development still eludes them. Ithas been assumed that the more education oneacquires the more wealth and therefore positivechange – modernization. Wealth accumulation andmodern life styles are not devoid in Africa.However, the continent still remains as one of themost backward. And the major drawbacks of theseapproaches are best manifested in third worldcountries. We have already described the objectiveliving conditions in Africa and there is no need torepeat them.

THE PROBLEM WITH THIRD WORLD EDUCATIONIt has been observed that third world countrieshave adopted a mechanical approach to education.Education ought to be a product of a society’sdevelopment and not the catalyst of development. Itshould be imparted as a means of conserving,perpetuating and sustaining the developmentachievements of a society. Education should enhancedevelopment by passing on knowledge, skills,science and technology, values and norms of thesociety. At the same it must improves upon societalaspects. Education should not be imported. It mustevolved and a product of a society.

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Misconceptions between education as an acquisitionof modern tastes and life styles or an accumulationof learned men and women have led to majorcontradictions, which have tranquilized the thirdworld into a false illusion of development. TheNorth has also petted the third world with wordslike “developing world” or “least developed world”whereas the truth of the matter is that for thelast 40 or so years, countries like Uganda haveretrogressed and are best described as“underdeveloping”.

First and foremost, modernity is an attitude ofmind associated with progress, efficiency,innovation and technological advancement. Advocatesof this theory believe that a society withoutindividuals with modern attitudes is out of thedevelopment race. But, Freire also observes thatwhile all development is modernization, not allmodernization is development (Freire Paulo;CULTURAL ACTION FOR FREEDOM, Penguin, victoria,1974, EDUCATION FOR CRITICAL CONSCIOUSNESS, TheSeabury Press, New York, 1969). In many third worldcountries, modernization is an inspiration andaspiration to lead the coveted lives of the westernworld or white man (mzungu). That is why Africansor third world people end up consuming what they donot produce and are unable to maintain such lifestyles. In the end the educated become parasites onthe less educated. Thus, the hydra of CORRUPTION.

The school has been the main culprit in inculcatingsuch archaic modern values and attitudes. Many ofthese are not direct products of classroom teaching

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but are taken up informally. Besides, the classroomteaching itself has no relevance to the objectivesurvival techniques of the society. The people arenot equipped to be instruments of fundamentalchange in their society. The people are changedwithout changing the society they live in. So theylive assumed lives of modernity in the midst of asea of backwardness. For example, when a chairbreaks in professor’s house, instead of fixing ithimself, he goes to Wandegeya and picks upsemiliterate carpenter to do the job.

Nevertheless, the truth of the matter is that manyAfricans have been debased to a level of wishingthemselves white. And at the heart of all this isthe idolization of the white man. For example, myyoungest son calls himself Rambo. His favorite playgames are of war. At the age of three, he asked meto buy him a gun.

The theory of modernization presupposes an embodiedelement of progress, which implies development. Butwhat it has done is to move people up and down thesocial ladder without changing the society and hasbecome an obstacle to development. It has failed tobring about change in the entire labyrinth ofsociety. What it has done is to cause a re-socialization. It has undone traditional socialvalues and norms and introduced alien ones. Thetraditional education based on survival theory hasbeen eroded. It has created modern people who frownupon their own cultures, values and norms. Themodern man or woman is an alien to his own people.This is the type of education dispensed by our

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schools, colleges and universities. It isformalized to prepare the “native” for his/her newrole of servicing and oiling the internationalcapitalist establishment.

The well-trodden path of the African, which hadbeen founded on his society’s needs, has beendismantled by education. Its place has been takenby a distorted mind and heart that makes Africansinferior to other races, primitive, inhuman, andworth nothing but the white man’s “civilization”.

To make it palatable, it has been seasoned andtinged with the sweet taste of “Human CapitalInvestment”. It is the catchword for development.Invest in education and behold development isyours. This has ensured that the educationtranquilizer works homogeneously. The theory cannot explain why there are thousands of educatedpeople roaming the streets in search of employment.Even then the wealth of educated people in thethird world has not automatically led todevelopment. Education has made the people go aftera “flying goal” or “mirage” called modernity. Ithas not also led to improved and increasedproductivity. Its adoption as a mass tool foreconomic development has met with little or nosuccess at all. Education has become a “DiplomaDisease” (Dore Donald; THE DIPLOMA DISEASE;QUALIFICATION AND DEVELOPMENT, George Allen andUnion, London, 1976). It is merely a passport to acoveted job, a status symbol or a license to a goodincome and access to national resources. The“diploma disease”, has smitten almost everybody

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from government planners, leaders our presidentinclusive to the poorest of parents in Kisenyi orGadumire.

To many people education is the magic wand and keyto the world of plenty. Yet, this individualexpectation is far from the aspirations andobjectives of society at large. The world of plentyis the modern world, where exploitation is theorder of the day. A world without respect for theculture of others and threatens to subjugate them.A world more ready to subjugate and domestic thoseit considers inferior. In a nutshell, education hasbeen used to lead individuals through the darktunnel of development but has left the rest ofsociety behind.

This is the education everybody clamors for underthe false illusion that it will bring aboutdevelopment. The largest proportion of products ofthis education are primary and secondary schoolgraduates. Their values, aspirations andexpectations have been raised but not fulfilled.They have been uprooted from the soil, which is themain source of livelihood and stay of our economy.They look down upon and despise manual labour. Theyhave flocked to the cities and towns in search ofnon-existence jobs. Production on the farms hasbeen left to the old men and women. Agriculturalproduction is going down the drain and the maincatalyst has been education.

This education has neither produced new productionmodes nor tools of production. But it has re-

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socialized people creating an elite parasiticclass. The poor peasants are now saddled with a newclass of people, which has neither respect fortheir culture or modes of production. This class ofpeople is more prepared to wrestle from the poorpeasant, by hook or crook, the produce of theirlabour. It is a class of affluent consumers andproducers of nothing. This is the “EducationDilemma” in Africa (Simons John; THE EDUCATIONDILEMMA; POLICY ISSUES FOR DEVELOPING COUNTRIES,Pergamon Press, New York, 1986).

The expected returns from education have become afar cry in the wilderness. Education has uprootedpeople from production roles to parasitic roles. Ithas bred conformity other than innovatiness. It hasbrought to a standstill scientific andtechnological development. This is the reason whydespite a lake of salt, Lake Katwe, Uganda importssalt. A hoe, a primitive tool of production, isstill imported. People can not even produce enoughto feed themselves. The people are unable toprovide for their basic needs – they must wearmivumba, use imported drugs at the risk of beingpoisoned etc. There are no factories worth talkingabout. The people are being fed on pre-masticatedculture, political philosophy, economic policies,science and technology, values and norms fromeither the capitalist West or socialist East.Education appears to have completely disruptedmodes and relations of production in the thirdworld and has rendered third world societies unableto usher in social economic development. It hasbeen the main vehicle of Africa’s underdevelopment.

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As a matter of fact, there is still the unansweredquestion whether education is the key to solvingthe problems of poverty or is education part of theproblem, at least the kind of education thatprevails in so much of the developing world? Iseducation a sure pathway to economic growth andbetter living standards, or is this not much morethan wishful thinking? In fact, we might bespending too much on education (especially of thewrong kind) divert scarce resources from othermeans of tackling poverty? (Jones, 2006:3)

In order to fight poverty through education, oneproblem for developing countries like Uganda hasbeen the establishment of inappropriate educationpolicies by multinational agencies through whatKlees (2002:452) has been described as ‘one sizefits all’ analysis and recommendations’. It isargued that decisions by multinational agencieslike the World Bank targeting poor countries canaggravate the poverty scourge instead of offering aremedy for economic recovery. This is particularlyso when the young people who graduate from thebasic education level become unable to helpthemselves and their communities due to the widegap between what they learn in the class rooms andthe real life experience in their communities.

In Uganda for example, disconnections between theeducation policy design and the context, is partlyto blame for ongoing wide spread poverty. Moreover,most people who influence the nature and shape of

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policies are not members of the community, and aretherefore less informed of the context.

WHAT IS TO BE DONE?This involves the formulation of education policiesthat target poverty reduction in developingcountries also need critical attention from in-depth research by insiders. Such research couldgive an insight into understanding the aspects ofdevelopment that such community already posses andwhat aspects need support. This may challenge theconstruction of education policies that wereintroduced by the colonial administration thatemphasized literacy and numeracy as has been thecase with many multinational agencies.

We need to critically examine the contributions ofdevelopment agencies like the World Bank, UnitedNations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), United NationsEducational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation(UNESCO), United Nations Development Programme(UNDP), Organisation for Economic Co-operation andDevelopment (OECD) and Department for InternationalDevelopment (DFID), to educational development andthe role of education in poverty reduction.

Today, educational policies are the focus ofconsiderable controversy and public contestation …Educational policy-making has become highlypoliticised’. (Olssen et al. 2004:2-3).

Therefore, this study aims to show how the WorldBank documents and strategies on education policyare influenced by global trends and its own

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ideology rather than the needs and aspiration ofthe communities the policy are intended to supportin alleviating poverty. As hermeneutical studiesasserts, a researcher cannot remain neutral orobjective in a study like this because theirperspectives and biases are integral to theirunderstanding of the text and the context. This isthe dilemma most African countries find themselvesin.

The solution to this dilemma is multi-faced;

Education for Self-reliance Mwalimu Nyerere Julius calls for “education forself-reliance (EDUCATION FOR SELF-RELIACE, UnitedRepublic of Tanzania Government Printer, Dar-es-Salaam, March 1967).It is argued that, African educational policieshave been carried out in a cultural and educationalpolicy and developmental vacuum in terms of Africanpeople’s everyday lives (Jagusah, 2001).Nevertheless, the importance of cultural relevancein educational processes is acknowledged by Marxistand neo-Marxist educational scholars as well as bysome conservative, capitalist and colonial-orientedwriters (Jagusah, 2001:114). The lack of culturalvalues inclusion into the educational policies ofmany developing countries could create a gapbetween education and poverty alleviation. While this background is important, the irrelevanceof curricula to context in supporting educationaldevelopment towards poverty alleviation in Africancountries is a major concern as discussed below.

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The high drop-outs rates in developing countries ingeneral and Uganda in particular could beattributed to inadequate connections between formaleducation and the local environment. For example,in Uganda, it is alleged that the administration ofeducation policies with little consideration forthe context created a gap between what childrenlearnt in the classrooms and what they interactwith in their local environment. Learners are notmotivated to learn because they do not know howuseful their learning is and what it could do fortheir personal development or for developing theirlocal communities. It is hard to imagine whateducation is all about if not passing examinationsand becoming an officer in the public service inthe long run. It is argued that the real and mostfundamental problem facing education in Africa isthe fact that the formal philosophy andorganization of the educational system has remainedpredominately foreign (Namuddu, 1991:41).

Education for Self-conscientizationFreire Paulo calls for “education for self-conscientization and freedom” (EDUCATION FORCRITICAL CONSCIOUSNESS, Seabury Press, New York,1969). The choice and usage of language in a socialresearch plays a pivotal role in shaping ourunderstanding and how we construct our realities ofthe world (Crotty, 1998). The perception ofhermeneutic that is adopted in this study isderived from the Greek word (hermeneuein), whichmeans ‘to interpret’ or ‘to understand’ (Crotty,1998). As Palmer (1969) points out:

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Underpinning this [hermeneutic] meaning in ancientGreek usage are the notions of ‘saying’,‘explaining’ and ‘translating’, which alreadysuggests the idea of addressing something that isin some way strange, separated in time or space oroutside of one’s experience, with the purpose ofrendering it familiar, present and intelligible(cited in Crotty, 1998:88).

Education is Cultural ImperialismMartin Carnoy in Fanon Frantz Education as CulturalImperialism advocates for a “revolution” to topplethe current political leadership in Africa (BLACKSKINS WHITE MASKS, Gove Press, New York, 1977).

Language of Instruction Teaching and learning whether unidirectional, bi directionalor multidirectional is in essence a communicative process.For the teacher and the learner to communicate effectively,they must use a language that both understand. Moreimportantly, the language of instruction mediates learningto the extent that it is primarily through words that onecan access new information and connect it to what onealready knows. It is also primarily through language thatone can display what one has learned when the opportunityarises. Indeed, language and thought are inextricablyinterwoven (Dembele and Ndoye, 2005). Language policy has thus been identified as one of the keyproblems deterring development progress in developingcountries. To emphasise this point further, Fafunwa (1990)argues that:

…there seems to be a correlation between underdevelopmentand the use of a foreign language as the official languageof a given country in Africa. We impart knowledge and skillsalmost exclusively in these foreign languages, while themajority of our people, farmers, and craftsmen perform their

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daily tasks in Luganda, Luo, Runyakitara, Yoruba, Hausa,Kiswahili, … The question is; why not help them to improvetheir social, economic, and political activities via theirmother tongue? ... (cited in Brock-Utne, 2001:119)

Bottom up Approach to education McNamara, former World Bank president calls for a bottom upapproach based on a radical revolutionary approach to thequestion of education and development. Today, educationalpolicies are the focus of considerable controversy andpublic contestation. Educational policy-making has becomehighly politicized’ (Olssen et al. 2004:2-3). Thepoliticization of education policy definitely calls now forthe democratization of education policy-making process ifsolution to the many social challenges includingproductivity and poverty reduction is to be realized.

The SchoolSchool must give pupils the capacity to acquire therelevant knowledge and interpret new values thatwill, in turn, guarantee them the ability to remainup to date with the evolution of the environment.If a concerted effort is not made to strengthen theautonomy of the individual, then human integrity isunder threat from influences that are replacingtraditional standards. (Hallak, 2000:28)On the other hand, the school, the formal source ofeducation must be made to relate to the needs ofthe community that it is meant to serve. Forexample I went to King’s College Budo into whosecompound the village community was forbidden tostep. The villagers even trembled when talking to amere student. That is why despite more than 80years of existence, Makerere is surrounded byslums. And this to many of us appears to be anormal phenomenon.

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The TeacherThe teachers should play a role model status but asthings stand today, the teachers are the mostpoorly remunerated professionals. They are poorlytrained and equipped for their job. They are poorlyclothed, malnourished and poorly housed. In many ofour village schools, the teachers go class drunkand reeking or stinking like a brewery.

TeachingTeachers need to understand a subject enough toconvey its essence to students. The goal is toestablish a sound knowledge base on which studentswill be able to build as they are exposed todifferent life experiences. The passing ofknowledge from generation to generation allowsstudents to grow into useful members of society.Good teachers can translate information, goodjudgment, experience and wisdom into relevantknowledge that a student can understand, retain andpass to others. Studies from the US suggest thatthe quality of teachers is the single mostimportant factor affecting student performance, andthat countries which score highly on internationaltests have multiple policies in place to ensurethat the teachers they employ are as effective aspossible. [16] However, in the Ugandan environmentthe effectiveness of teachers is highlyquestionable as teachers are often paid less thanother similar professions.

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TechnologyTechnology is an increasingly influential factor ineducation. Computers and mobile phones are used indeveloped countries both to complement establishededucation practices and develop new ways oflearning such as online education (a type ofdistance education). This gives students theopportunity to choose what they are interested inlearning. The proliferation of computers also meansthe increase of programming and blogging.Technology offers powerful learning tools thatdemand new skills and understandings of students,including Multimedia, and provides new ways toengage students, such as Virtual learningenvironments. Technology is being used more notonly in administrative duties in education but alsoin the instruction of students. The use oftechnologies such as PowerPoint and interactivewhiteboard is capturing the attention of studentsin the classroom. Technology is also being used inthe assessment of students. One example is theAudience Response System (ARS), which allowsimmediate feedback tests and classroom discussions.Information and communication technologies (ICTs)are a “diverse set of tools and resources used tocommunicate, create, disseminate, store, and manageinformation.” These technologies include computers,the Internet, broadcasting technologies (radio andtelevision), and telephony. There is increasinginterest in how computers and the Internet canimprove education at all levels, in both formal andnon-formal settings. Older ICT technologies, such

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as radio and television, have for over forty yearsbeen used for open and distance learning, althoughprint remains the cheapest, most accessible andtherefore most dominant delivery mechanism in bothdeveloped and developing countries.

The use of computers and the Internet is in itsinfancy in developing countries, if these are usedat all, due to limited infrastructure and theattendant high costs of access. Usually, varioustechnologies are used in combination rather than asthe sole delivery mechanism.The CurriculumFor the purpose of this study, curriculum relevancewill be understood as a set of courses that arepurposefully designed with considerations for thecultural values of the particular community forwhom the curriculum is intended. As Winch andGingell (2004) point out, The curriculum must, byits very nature, draw upon the culture of thesociety for which it is a curriculum. If it is tobe a worthwhile curriculum it must involve makingvalue choices as to what items of our cultureshould be included and what should be excluded(Winch and Gingell, 2004:33)

In order to reduce poverty through education inpost-conflict Africa, the learning process of thecommunities need to progress from known to theunknown. This means that some aspects of thecultural practices of these communities need to beintegrated into the curriculum development processto strengthen the ownership of such curriculum bythat society.

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While there is no one single definition of culture,functionally there is an overwhelming acceptancethat it is ‘…a system of norms and control’, aswell as ‘a map’ that gives a group a sense ofdirection (Pai and Adler 1997:23). As Jagusah(2001:114) argue: This map of, or for, a group of people or asociety, is what enables the group to evaluatewhere it has been, where it is now, and where ithopes to go. A mastery of this ‘system of norms andcontrol’ – this ‘map’ – enables one to connect thepast to the present as well as the future.(Jagusah, 2001:114)

One of the major problems that hindered qualityeducation in Uganda since independence has been theinappropriate curriculum that are designed withlittle or no consideration for the local context interms of the local culture, customs and values.When the values and ways of livelihood of thecommunity is ignored in the curriculum developmentprocess, education is perceived as a foreign idea,a tool of subjugation that has very little tocontribute to the lives of the community apart fromspeaking in a foreign language and rural urbanmigration.

The school curriculum has to be changed to caterfor the aspirations, objectives and ideals of thecommunity. The curriculum has to impart knowledge,skills, technologies and political and culturalattitudes, values and norms that relate to realobjective conditions in the society. The knowledgelearnt should be a tool of our revolution.

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Education should be a “master key” to thedevelopment process. There is a major draw backtoday is that education is becoming increasinglyinternational. Not only are the materials becomingmore influenced by the rich internationalenvironment, but exchanges among students at alllevels are also playing an increasingly importantrole. This is where our schools have producedpeople who are ill-relevant in our societies. Theyhave nothing to offer to the African society butconfusion.

Education is a Human RightThe right to education has been described as abasic human right: since 1952, Article 2 of thefirst Protocol to the European Convention on HumanRights obliges all signatory parties to guaranteethe right to education. At world level, the UnitedNations' International Covenant on Economic, Socialand Cultural Rights of 1966 guarantees this rightunder its Article 13. All members of society shouldbe able to access this education and it must berecurrent – education for life.

As we talk today, if you have passed through thecurrent regular gradation of classroom educationand you have not been made a fool, you mustconsider yourself very lucky. If the education youhave received has given you an intelligent approachto life, it must have made you a radical subjectiveelement of your political, social, economic andphysical environment. It should turn you into asubjective instrument of change not an object ofchange. Are you that kind of person?

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