When I was growing up in rural Kenya, the village knew who is who in secondary schools. Those in “good” high schools became village celebrities. Indeed, whenever we used to see those who were in A (Advanced Secondary) levels (under the old 7-4-2-3 system of education) we would revere their mastery of English and knowledge on just about every subject under the sun.
They were heroes and heroines of some sort. Being a village boy who could not speak a coherent English sentence without taking time to strategise, these guys used to bewilder me with the ease with which the foreign tongue flowed from their tongues.
Being in big national schools where they rubbed shoulders with students from other tribes, they would also occasionally throw in a word or two of strange Kenyan languages to our bewilderment. Of course University students were out of this world. These were real champions. Given they walked around armed ‘boom’ (varsity allowances), they were up there with the gods.
During recess, I used to see numerous graduates carrying nice umbrellas to protect themselves from light drizzles that we villagers did not consider as rain. And they were studying unbelievably difficult things transport geography, wood science and technology and a strange thing called Botzoo.
But by the time we found ourselves in university, the allure was fading. The economy was suffering from severe marasmus and unemployment was becoming a norm with jobless graduates being forced to operate from seedy rooms in Huruma from where they set out every morning to hunt for jobs in the city centre.
READ MORE
Let's do more to ensure every child gets quality education
Truth be told, Social sciences have their soft underbelly too
I still don’t know how many of us overcome that nightmare and made something out of our lives. There was gloom staring us from every direction. We seemed destined for eternal failure. And slowly, like the dwindling fortunes and tired wardrobe of the underpaid lecturer, university education started to lose its shine.
Not that things have improved much in the employment sphere. In fact getting a good job today borders on many combinations, including luck. Some research findings estimate that about 1.2 million Kenyans are joining the labour market each year. This is mainly graduates from the various levels of the schooling system including universities. If you add this to the already existing pool of unemployed plus the many people facing massive retrenchments from the private sector, it really looks ugly.
Yet it is estimated the economy is creating a mere 50,000 decent and not so decent jobs annually. Some have touted entrepreneurship as the cure of the problem. Quite doubtful, with the inadequate demand (which also means ability to pay) for the goods and services. So the propensity to sustain numerous businesses is quite small compared to the high rate of unemployment and population growth. There is a lot we have to do on the economy.
So when I see kindergarten graduation photos splashed all over Facebook, I only wish parents could be more realistic. At times we dream too much. Well, education is important today as it shall remain into perpetuity. But we also need to start asking tough questions. We must demand of our leaders to ensure that our babies’ colourful graduations at Kindergarten are a promise of a brighter future, grounded in quality basic and tertiary education geared for a dynamic, vibrant and rewarding job market. But we cannot even begin to ask these questions when even the educated masses sleep, eat, drink and dream tribe.
Harrison Mwirigi Ikunda is a researcher and consultant based in Nairobi.
