Driving towards an Afrocentric Curriculum in African Schools
The realization that each person must first be an individual before we can all be society is one that, sadly, very few Africans have been able to arrive at.
The CCAF’s goal of empowering the African mind through education is taking a bold step in the right direction by exploring an Afrocentric path to education in Africa.
The power of the individual has been overlooked in the educational sector, leading to vast amounts of overdependent individuals who have no understanding of their identity. Individuals, who though, educated, have no true appreciation of the components that make up the core of who they are.
The Correct Connect Africa Foundation looks to erase this problem by cutting deep into the educational sector. Schools are now being contacted and sensitized about the Afrocentric approach to education in Africa, the first of these schools to key into this idea is Blooming Lights College (BLC).
In a meeting with the head of the school and the team organising the opening of the Blooming Light College, the CCAF General Coordinator, Fr. Anthony Aleakwe Odior, gave a passionate lecture about the need to educate the leaders of tomorrow on the importance of the African past.
Cheikh Anta Diop, an African historian, philosopher, anthropologist, scientist and politician, once said, “Intellectuals ought to study the past, not for the pleasure they find in so doing, but to derive lessons from it”.
Marching forever forward without learning anything from the past has proven to be detrimental to the prosperity of every individual, not to talk of an entire society.
The African educational sector has been focused on beautiful innovative ideas for a bright future, but it has equally neglected the intrinsic lessons that the past has to offer.
Our children grow in the knowledge of what to do but lack knowledge of what has been done. This leaves them clueless about why they are to do what they are to do. The process breeds entire generations of zombies who just do things without understanding the reasons for doing them.
The staff of Blooming Lights College (BLC) were excited at the prospects of this new idea and were already brainstorming ways to implement Afrocentric patterns and concepts in their school’s curriculum.
It is important to note that while the realisation of some of these realities could lead to anger or hatred for the ghosts of Africa’s past, it is not this anger and hatred that we wish to pass on to our children. We want them to have a strong sense of understanding of whom they are and what they stand for, as opposed to swaying aimlessly with the winds of change that modern society continues to propagate.
It is a bold step in the right direction and with many more schools keying into this new system, the potential for a greater and more African society is limitless.
This is just one of many facets that constitute the aims and objectives of the Correct Connect Africa Foundation. For this project to make any reasonable impact, it is important, if not necessary, that other schools and institutions in the educational sector not only key into this idea but understand the need to do so.
In the words of the great Malcolm X – “We need more light about each other. Light creates understanding, understanding creates love, love creates patience, and patience creates unity”.
Afrocentricism is the key to a healthy future for Africa.
