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The day before New Year's Eve my high school alma
mater had a reunion for alumni. This was the first
such event in the school's 40-year history. This
event gave us an opportunity not only to look at the
campus' new facilities, but also to open up a time
capsule that my class had put there a decade ago
when we graduated from high school. There were about
five of us from my graduating class that were there
to do the honours, the remaining 26 scattered across
the four corners of the globe.
It was good seeing everyone again; there are of
course memories, things to reminisce about and lives
to catch up on. Some are married with children,
others are millionaires, some have gone into family
businesses, some are still finding their feet, but
all around, we have ended up all right; not great,
but okay. Categorising my class as 32 brats (five of
them not so much so) from the most elite private
school in the country is a bold statement, but after
the things that we were shown that day, I believe
that if anyone were to go and see the same things
that I did, you would by no means disagree.
As we were taken on a tour of the new facilities we,
whom time had made slightly keener on reality and a
bit more functional in the ways of Ethiopianess,
were shocked and a bit envious at all the luxuries
and amenities that were available to teenagers.
Although we cracked jokes that it was our parents'
money that had provided it, it was still
unbelievable. While our class had available what
many schools at the time did not in our chemistry
and biology laboratories, gyms, tracks, baseball
diamonds, complete libraries, and amphitheatre, now,
these very same things have been brought up to the
21st century standards of a New England private
school, with about the same prices, if not slightly
more expensive.
A
few of us then, and even fewer Ethiopians now, have
access to such realities. They have added more
classrooms, large open spaces, a great band room,
the track has been upgraded to professional
standard, and even the most famous Ethiopian runners
go there to use it. There are high school and
elementary computer labs, full offices for each
teacher, full cafeteria, student store that offers
all the American standard school materials required.
The laboratories are amazing; we walked into a
biology class and it was like walking into a movie
set, projector going, skulls and skeletons
everywhere, top of the line electronic microscopes
with their own section to be used in. I have never
felt prouder to say that I am a product of the
school, and I am sure in their hearts many of my
classmates and the other alums that were there felt
that way.
We had the chance to see some of the staff that had
stayed on from the time that we were there and we
got a chance to reminisce with them as well. Of
course, some mentioned how different everything was
now; the school had become much smaller and a lot
more like a fancy maximum security prison with all
the high gates and barbed wire. There are about 400
students from the kindergarten level all the way up
to 12th grade. But this is in no way by fault of the
school; none would be happier to diversify its
already large range of nationalities, but according
to a directive issued by the Ministry of Education
(MoE) in 1996, Ethiopians are no longer allowed to
enrol in international community schools.
Even if it were open to all Ethiopians, few in the
country would actually be able to pay that sort of
money to educate their children; the high school is
now around the 15,000 dollars a year range and the
elementary and middle schools of course would be
incrementally cheaper, although that is a relative
term.
But why pass such a law and force people to have to
either follow a failing curriculum or narrow their
choices simply because it does not suit your
political agenda?
One of the failings of the EPRDF government is in
its educational policies. It is one thing to build
schools but a totally different question to be able
to produce functional informed and intelligent
people out of them. The elementary level education
that is offered at public and private schools does
not prepare the students for the middle and high
school levels of education that is offered. One of
the main reasons is that there is no flow in the
manner in which education is given to students.
The mechanisms that are used in the lower levels of
education are completely overhauled and the student
is launched into a different system when entering
high school. It is this new disaster of a policy
that allows 15 and 16 year-old kids to enter college
and university. But that would be acceptable if the
education that was provided from the start was
comprehensive and able to produce functional human
beings; instead, university graduates are not even
able to form simple questions and communicate their
points in English or Amharic for that matter.
Every Ethiopian, like their right to breathe and
exist, also has the right to a functional education
that is the responsibility of the state to provide.
If it cannot do that, then it should allow those who
can to provide the highest standards without putting
holds and bars on their work. There has been a
steady decline in the quality of education because
there have not been viable solutions used to solve
the problems that are faced by the sector.
If it is a democracy that we are trying to build and
allow to flourish in this country, then it is
absolutely vital that the citizens that will be
charged with continuing this task are fully
equipped.
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