“What in the world does classical Christian education have to do with Africa? What Africans really need is training in farming. All I see on the news are famines across Africa. They need to learn to feed themselves. In other words, why doesn’t someone teach them how to fish instead of just giving them fish?”
While talking with friends at a wedding recently, someone asked me about the Rafiki Foundation’s work in ten African countries. I explained that we were teaching the Bible and offering classical Christian education, and that is when I got the farming question.
It is not a bad question. In fact, it is one that has been debated for years, not just in Africa, but since the time of the ancient philosophers. Just give people, especially materially poor people, the basics. Give them skills, technical training, or the trades so they can earn a living. Isn’t that what education is for?
In Africa, the Rafiki Foundation is providing classical Christian education in ten countries, and it is working. We think all humanity deserves something more than an education that simply prepares them for a test or job.
We believe Classical Christian Education (CCE) is the best education for any human being, across any culture, because it aims to cultivate wisdom and virtue. This aim of education does more than equip one to make a living, it enables one to have a satisfying and purposeful life. Classical Christian Education does more than help you learn one thing; it equips you to learn to do anything.
What Africa needs now is more than just training in farming or coding, that is the kind of education it has received since the early twentieth century. An education in the Christian liberal arts, however, has not been tried on a grand scale in Africa. This is what the Rafiki Foundation is doing.
Why does this work for Africa?
CCE works in Africa because for over 2,000 years it was the education of the church. From Augustine to Aquinas, from Calvin to Luther, and even into the nineteenth century, CCE formed the minds and hearts of Christians. Africa has over 600 million professing Christians. Why not give them the established education of the church, connecting them to and unifying them through the historic Christian faith and traditions? This is not to make African Christians European in their expressions of worship or customs, but to ground them in theology and history, allowing for cultural variety while remaining true to the basic doctrines of the faith.
Secondly, Classical Christian education works in Africa because it is a far better fit for African culture than the progressive education model that has been the standard of education since the early twentieth century. CCE resonates more with African culture and its traditional forms of education in three areas: community, authority, and history.
In many African communities, the child is not in charge—the elders are. Certainly, the child is valued and schooled in the culture and traditions of the community, but they do not determine culture and traditions; it is the elders who preserve and pass on culture, traditions, and history. That, too, is the mindset of classical Christian education: the privileging of community over rampant individualism. In many African countries and among the thousands of ethnic groups, there is a strong sense of community. Classical Christian education certainly develops the individual’s gifts and character, but it also fosters a strong sense of community while engaging in the great conversation through the great works of the centuries—works infused with the true, the good, and the beautiful, and which create a meaningful, shared history.
Finally, CCE is for Africa because it is the education of free men. With the desire among many Africans for true democratic governance, the best way to preserve and strengthen democracy is to embrace the education that gave rise to democracies in the first place. The liberal arts are designed to equip and free people to think for themselves and participate in democratic societies. We need thinking men and women of wisdom and virtue to preserve and protect a democracy.
So how is it working in Africa?
Classical Christian education is the best choice for Africa because it teaches people not only how to fish, but how to do more with the fish caught.
The Rafiki Foundation operates model classical Christian schools in ten African countries. Established in 1985 to bring Bible study and help people raise their standard of living, Rafiki has concentrated its work in these ten countries. Within each of these ten countries sits a 50-acre bustling campus comprised of a fully established children’s home, a PreK–12 classical Christian school, and in seven of our ten campuses is a teacher’s college. With these resources and institutions, Rafiki is not only helping 5,000 African students and staff cultivate wisdom and virtue but is also poised to equip a thousand African church schools to do the same.
Rafiki has developed an international-level classical Christian curriculum and three-year teacher’s college courses for the purpose of providing this education not only within the ten countries Rafiki Villages exist, but also for the thousands of church schools across Africa. The material has been field-tested for over 20 years with African PreK-12 grade students and African teachers and, by initial local measures, it is providing an excellent education for young people in the Christian liberal arts. Graduates have performed well on national exams and qualified for tertiary education at rates well above the national averages. In many of these countries, the national pass rate on exams is around 50 percent, whereas Rafiki students have a 95 percent pass rate.
While it is too early to have statistically measurable evidence of long-term outcomes, there are very promising results. Hundreds of Rafiki high school graduates have gone to university, and now dozens are graduating from university and entering a variety of professions and vocations. Most have a sound faith in Jesus Christ, as evidenced by their lifestyle and participation in local churches; Rafiki college students often host Bible studies in their university dormitories. University graduates are entering influential fields—we have young women who are now engineers, young men who are lawyers, and a half-dozen students entering the medical field to become doctors or nurses.
Our school days resemble those of classical Christian schools in the United States in many respects. One U.S.-based classical Christian education leader visited Rafiki schools in Africa and afterwards reflected saying he would gladly put his child in one of our schools. Here is an example of a day in a Rafiki classical Christian school:
“You would see children in grade one learning phonics, grade three being introduced to writing and rhetoric, grade eight making pyramids in history class and later in the day studying formal logic, grade ten learning about famous scientists during biology class, grade eleven reading Much Ado About Nothing, and grade twelve finishing their two-year course in rhetoric.”
Three other distinctives of Rafiki’s CCE model in Africa should also be recognized. First, not only are African students experiencing this feast of an education, but they are also being exposed to the common arts by which they can support themselves. In addition, a thorough study of the Bible takes precedent, and all students study the Bible as the first class of the day. Lastly, we ensure Rafiki students receive formal instruction in a local African language, study African history, art, and literature, and retain the true, the good, and the beautiful of their cultural traditions.
Yes, by God’s grace, this education can prepare men and women to be farmers and financiers, carpenters and corporate leaders, businessmen and businesswomen, and Bible teachers. The vision is altering the African continent—a multitude of godly contributors who continue to develop the true, good, and beautiful in ways unique to their cultures and lead future generations to do the same. This is what Africa needs.
Submitted by:
Karen J. Elliott, Executive Director, Rafiki Foundation, Inc.
You can also find out more at the Rafiki Foundation website:
And podcast: Episode 29: Cultivating Classi… - The Rafiki Foundation - Apple Podcasts
Youtube channel: Rafiki Foundation - YouTube
