Education In Ghana: The Cowboy’s Story

Just as formal education was reckoned to be the panacea to an end in poverty and a force for industrial transformation at independence, the country’s traditional civilization with regards to occupation was even much more dominant to be submerged by the armor of European and western civilization.

I tell this story of myself specifically related to education, as a young boy of African descent growing in bright vitality and fantasy in a free and liberal environment in which daily survival was woven around a proud and traditional routine activity of animal rearing and food crops cultivation. My interest in telling this story arises from a recent event which speaks loudly of the culture of Africa and Ghana in years before and after independence.

This event is of two young cattle locked horn to horn in a fight to settle a dispute of superiority in a sub-urban setting. This event speaks well of the lives of young children who are often made to spend their childhood in valleys and flat fields lined by grassland in a bid to sustain the lives of cattle that formed the wealth and livelihood of their families.

Before independence, education in Ghana can best be classified into the pre-colonial and the colonial times. During the pre-colonial time, education was based purely on non-formal methods of transmitting knowledge including oral storytelling and unstructured apprenticeships. However, with the arrival of Europeans led by the Portuguese, the British, the Danes and the Dutch, education became formalized, structured and organized around the forts and castles and accessed by only the families of influential chiefs and wealthy traders resident in the coastal part of the Gold Coast at the time.

Clearly during the colonial era in the 1800s, the British took total control and education was led by the efforts of the missionaries. Even close to the end of the 20th century, education was still largely concentrated in the coastal part of the country and in other metropolitan cities midland. The northern part of the country was largely cut off with regards to access to educational facilities.

In Navrongo in the Upper East region of Ghana where I was born and raised, the first basic school was established in the 1940s just before independence. At that time, the lifestyle of the people could be described as very rudimentary as my father tells his story of male school children attending school in triangular pants whiles their female counterparts sit absolutely naked in school.

He tells of having to spend only one day in a classroom due to the fact that his father, my grandfather, would not allow any of his children to attend school. According to him, school children were regarded as thieves at the time. This was because at the time, school children hardly got any food to eat at home before leaving for school. As a result of this, they often felt so hungry whiles in school and compelled to chance on the food crops on farms that surrounded their schools.

For my grandfather, his children would have to grow in the culture of cultivating large farmlands and keeping as many animals as possible to assure them of a sustained livelihood. Education in formal structures was seen as a waste of time with respect of the nature of livelihoods. The food that school children had to depend on came from the farmlands that could not be deserted in favor of formal education. Apart from that, the benefits of formal education were likened to the root tubers which one spends so much time and energy cultivating without having any idea of what was in the soil.

The most important aspect of agriculture to my grandfather was the fact that its dividends were a great source of prestige and a huge store of value. My grandfather was said to have ridiculed a young man into buying cattle for his family when the young man boasted around with money while there wasn’t a single animal in his household. According to my father, the young man greeted my grandfather and he decided not to respond.

The young man smelling a rat, went away quietly and returned later the same evening to find out if he had offended my grandfather in anyway. When the young man confronted my old man, he said he was disappointed in him, and that was why he decided not to answer to his greetings. He went on to ask him why he should be boasting around with so much money and yet leaves his house so empty with no single animal such that when someone pisses in the compound, the urine runs out without a stop. The young man thanked him, left, and within a week, bought a cow. Interestingly, this young man’s household now boasts of the largest number of cattle in the community.

However, despite the great indication of pride in it, the size of a household’s ranch was inversely related to the number of school children. This was because if the ranch is large, only few children will be allowed to go to school; and if the ranch is small, a lot more children will be allowed to go to school. This is in view of the many number of children needed to take care of a large ranch.

In my case, being present in school was due to influence from my parents and elder siblings; but being absent was due solely to my own determination to stay at home so as to engage in activities that yielded better satisfaction than could be found within the walls of a classroom. At home, my parents had a few cattle because they wanted all their children to go to school and be literate in view of the fact that they had an abiding believe that if their children were to be in school, they would be more successful than their grandparents. They believed quite well that the dividends of formal education were far greater and assured for those who worked hard.

They also were influenced by their belief that one will not always be healthy and strong as in his youth to sustain a farm or a ranch to support oneself. They doubted the ability of the land they were cultivating to be a dependable asset for a lifetime of repeated cultivation on an annual basis. Most of all, my parents saw that a lot of people were leaving their farms and cattle in the fields in order to be part of the new revolution of life and wanted their children to take part. Because of that, they will name their grandson Apo-eta (also take part) emphasizing that if they had not allowed their children to go to school like their parents did, the benefits they are enjoying presently would have been lost.

Because of these beliefs, my parents enrolled me in the only government primary school in the community when I was six years old – the enrollment age for basic education in the country. But three factors accounted for my decision to drop out of school before finishing the first year. My class teacher applied corporal punishment in order to correct his pupils and maintain discipline; most of my colleagues were not in school, so I felt quite lonely; and most importantly to me at the time, I loved to be a cowboy taking care of my father’s cattle and watching them wrestle. In short, I just loved to spend my life as free and fluid as a cowboy than that of a school boy confined within the four walls of a classroom.

Whenever I decided not to go to school, I would either leave the house early to hide behind a huge baobab tree behind our house, or I would dress for school and on the way, I would divert to the dam to fish with my friends who were not attending school only to join the school children on their way back home.

As a child, I had so much self-confidence and so I confronted my parents and told them of my intention to stop schooling so as to take care of the few cattle we had. I was much motivated in following the cattle – as we used to call it - because of a particular bullock we had which was very strong and had a strong ability to wrestle other bullocks which were even bigger than it. Together with my colleagues, I took my father’s cattle to places as far as 7 to 10 miles from home each day depending on where there was abundant fresh grass for our cattle and where we could have so much fun.

As shepherds, we would eat dry millet soaked with water, soaked groundnuts, roasted fresh millet as well as gari (milled cassava) mixed with sugar. I took so much delight in ensuring that my cattle grazed enough each day, so much such that one day I was returning home so late at night and someone asked whether my strongest bullock was pregnant. I had so much passion and sympathy for my cattle so much that when one of them was so ill and weak, I used to walk directly behind it and sing its name as we return home to avoid leaving it behind.

As my two elder brothers went to school, my younger sister would stick behind me and the cattle wherever we went. She was so close to me that she loved everything I did, so she followed me to school when I decided to give up the passion for shepherd life and embrace formal education.

I suddenly became passionate about school at a time my parents also decided to sell my strongest bullock. Even though I think I cultivated strong interest in education, it was not because of the sale of the bullock because I never lost interest being a shepherd as well. The sale of the bullock was a calculated move by my elder siblings and parents because the only thing they did with the money was that they bought a bed with the money from it. I never felt bad by their decision because I had come to a certain believe that if I did not go to school, my colleagues will one day insult me in English should I remain illiterate.

With that new found passion, I got a new school uniform and sandals, and headed back to school having lost two years. Up until now, my mother easily remembers it and laughs at me anytime she is told of any child who refuses to go to school. That nonetheless, I was the most truant pupil in Class One as I could attend school two days and be absent for up to a week due to my desire to be with my cattle in the fields. To my class teacher, I was too brilliant to be absent too often. She called pupils who were from my community to find out the real reason for my truancy and even contemplated repeating me in Class One after having cancelled my name from the class register. I had nothing but pity for her at the time because she felt so sad for my inability to be regular in school. When she braced all confidence and promoted me to class two, I became so afraid I would have lost another year, and so I decided against all inner influences to be regular and punctual in school from then on.

As I continued to class two, my class teachers began to take good notice of my intelligence as proven in class work and tests, but I was not surprised the least because I used to be very close to my elder brothers and their friends who fancied speaking English and learning at home. I realized so well that my areas of great strength at primary school were English language and environmental studies which entailed lessons about the history of Ghana. I was current with the names of countries in the world as well as prominent leaders in Ghana and beyond. I remember winning an award which I never received as my class teacher thought he was out to tease us with the full name of J. J. Rawlings, then president of Ghana. As I raised my hand and stood up, he could only be amazed when I shot out the full name Jerry John Rawlings and even added the title Flt Lt.

That nonetheless, I would always find time during weekends or public holidays to go and fraternize with my friends in the fields with their cattle and cease the chance to watch the animals lock horns. Obviously, the future held so much promise for me through education as I emerged tops of the entrance exam that qualified me into the Junior High School. Indeed, it was an important achievement topping in that exam because my elder brother decided to move me from the community school to start middle school in one of the prominent mission schools in the district. Therefore, I sat the exam with other pupils from different schools within the district.

During that time, I found a new friend who helped me put to bed my long time interest in cattle. I spent so much time playing football at home so much such that during the final exam at middle school, I would always return to play football after each day’s set of papers rather than preparing for the next papers. My interest in football was not as deep as that in cattle, but I never played at school. As I climbed up the academic ladder, my concentration in academic activities took center stage and I shelved all play.

At Senior High School, I chose to study Economics, Geography and Government which interest I harbored since middle school. Later, I would succeed in winning two Regional Independence Day Debates for my school as principal debate speaker and also lead the entire student body as president of the Students Representative Council.

Right after Senior High School, I would choose to study Rural Development at the university at the expense of a career in health information because of my passion to acquire the capacity needed to improve the poverty situation in my community.

It is a situation that enslaves the most beautiful dreams and arrests all potential opportunities of a better life. Many do not have access to electricity, potable water is accessed by those who can afford to walk a minimum of two kilometers, basic health centers and schools are accessed across streams, recreational facilities are absent and work opportunities for even tertiary graduates are acutely limited. It is not surprising therefore to find the human resources of the community badly weakened in capacity as a result of several health challenges such as preventable diseases of children, school dropouts due to high and unaffordable school fees, as well as challenges of balanced nutrition due to heavy dependence on staple food crops.

As a graduate, I find job opportunities so hard to come by in my drive to make a positive contribution to the development efforts of my people; but being part of the leadership of the youth of my community and working to promote youth education especially at the basic level as well as organizing recreational activities to keep the youth from negative endeavors, has been fulfilling thus far.

This passion for uplifting poor communities especially through education has motivated me to stay on and work as a volunteer for a community Senior High School for two years now after completing my National Service. As the lead administrator of the school, I foresee a great future in the academic life of such a humble and helpless institution that is struggling for absorption by the government.

Aside my passion for community led development, my interest in enlightening humanity to promote freedom and opportunity has turned me into a prolific writer with the online portal Modern Ghana Web. Regardless of how interesting you might find this article, my best article remains one published by Modern Ghana Web titled Community Organizing can Replace Failing States and NGOs in Developing Poor Rural Communities.

If at the last moment of my life I realize I have turned successful in operating an NGO that implements the Community Government Project in poor rural communities; become a successful teacher and lecturer; and having worked as a broadcast journalist, then I will consider my life well lived.

Even as the challenge of taking children from the cattle fields to the classroom continues to persist, the strides of the state to promote education are yielding results as literacy rates currently stand at 78.3 percent for males and 65.3 for females. It must be stated however that, this improvement lacks balance both in terms of gender and geography. Also, of the about 8 million literate population, more than 7 million failed to make it across the basic level. In view of this, a lot needs to be done to promote sustained enrollment of females as well as children in rural communities. If the major challenge of lack of access created by high cost of education is addressed, we are most likely to see an empty cattle field and flooded classrooms in Ghana.

By David Azuliya

Mobile: 0505005012

Email: [email protected]