Educating Beyond the Mind

GUEST EDITORIAL BY KENNY PASENSIE

Most South Africans will have been at a loss for words when they learned of reports of racial segregation at a private school in Pretoria.

The Curro Foundation School in Roodeplaat was accused of racially segregating pupils into different classrooms, holding separate meetings for white and black parents, employing an all-white teaching staff, and not teaching indigenous African languages.

How can it be that in 2015, two decades into building our rainbow nation, we should hear that a school had taken the decision to separate young learners by their race?

The incident was made worse by the school’s attempts to justify its practices.

The regional manager of the Curro group of schools explained that the reason for keeping the black and white learners separate had nothing to do with their race but rather that children are better at making friends with their own kind — those from their own culture.

According to reports, the school’s management also conceded they adopted the segregation measures to prevent “white flight” from the school in the face of increasing black enrolments.

Alarmingly, this was not an isolated incident by one school; rather it represents a growing phenomenon of racism in schools.

Should South Africa’s schools not be seen as places for nation-building and social integration (which many doubtless are)?

Is the school not a place where our children learn to interact and socialise with not only those that look and sound like them but also with those who are different from them, even the complete opposite?

Is school just a place where our kids learn that one plus one equals two and that an amoeba is a single-celled organism? Do we educate only the mind and not the heart?

Education is much more than just acquiring knowledge. It is, as Pope Francis told Italian school teachers, parents and learners, “either positive or negative; either it enriches or it impoverishes; either it enables a person to grow or it lessens, even corrupts him”.

“The mission of schools is to develop a sense of truth, of what is good and beautiful. And this occurs through a rich path made up of many ingredients,” Pope Francis said. “This is why there are so many subjects — because development is the result of different elements that act together and stimulate intelligence, knowledge, the emotions, the body, and so on.”

True education, the pope went on to say, “enables us to love life and opens us to the fullness of life”.

So how do we become enablers of Pope Francis’ idea of education? More importantly, why should we become champions of Pope Francis’ idea of education?

The “why” part is perhaps easier to answer. It is simple: if we don’t follow the philosophy articulated by the pope, our society is doomed to repeat the same errors of the old South Africa.

The “how” part is a challenge because it requires us to move out of our comfort zones and be far more vigilant about what kind of education our children receive.

How can we do this? Firstly, we must get more involved in school governance by being available to stand for school governing bodies or school boards.

We often convince ourselves that we don’t have the time or ability to serve, but shouldn’t we simply just make the time?

Secondly, when comment is sought on draft education policies and legislation, we must make an effort to express our views, even if only to say that a particular policy or piece of legislation is a move in the right direction.

Lastly, parents should never forget that they are the first teachers. It is in the family that our children learn to co-exist with others and above all to learn to value differences.

These values they then take to school, for better or for worse.

It is incumbent on us to make sure that our children receive a true education, one that not only teaches them the mathematical relationship between numbers but also the relationships between human beings.