Academic Hallmarks
OUR SEVEN EDUCATIONAL HALLMAKRS
The Educational Hallmarks of Global Compact Schools are seven that chart new ways for
21stCentury education in a constantly fragmented and disruptive educative landscape.
- Fraternity: This is key to achieving our educational objectives of forming sound scholars who will cooperate with others, give their own lives meaning and bring the needed transformation that the Continent deserves. Fraternity presupposes encounter, solidarity, mercy, generosity, dialogue, and exchange, habits that are essential if we must put our pupils at the centre of the educational experience. Fraternity sparks creativity, innovation, collaboration, harmony, and peace in the learning environment which are essential for success in a fragmented and disruptive society. Fraternity is key to establishing a global village of education. There is a common saying that schools are not buildings but meaningful relationships. This is true of Africa3H schools where relationships are put at the center of the learning process. Our Schooling experience confirms that a fruitful education does not primarily depend on the preparation of the teacher or the skills of the pupil, but on the quality of the relationship that is established between them. Several education scholars have pointed out that it is not the teacher who educates the pupil in a one-way transmission, nor do pupils alone build their knowledge, but rather it is their relationship that educates both teachers and pupils in a dialogical exchange that presupposes and exceeds them at the same time.
- Education for Positive Change and Empowerment: Africa is crying for peace, justice, brotherhood, responsibility, and commitment to change all the wicked fruits of misery, wars, unemployment, and greed generated by poor leadership and a self-centered culture. Can there be change in Africa? Africa E5 educational institutions believe in educating for positive Change and empowerment. And for this to be effective, it must begin from childhood. This explains why AfricaE5 places a lot of emphasis on building the next generation of kids and young men and women who will bring the needed positive change that the continent requires. Accordingly, education for Positive change and empowerment can only be effectively realized if African kids and youths are educated and empowered to be owners of their own destiny. Building young scholars with passion for what they do and inspiring them to achieve their God given talents will bring the needed change of a new humanity that will put others and not self as the basis of relationships.
- Differentiated Pedagogy: While traditional education has always presented diversity as a threat, Africa E5 believes that Schools must foster a kind of thinking and working that expresses unity in diversity and considers differences as a blessing to our identity and not as a cumbersome obstacle to self-fulfillment. In Africa E5 schools, our pupils and students do not see themselves as enemies or adversaries to be eliminated by a one size fits all kind of educational system. Through a Differentiated pedagogy acknowledges that scholars have multiple intelligences and the Growth Mindset to learn anything to their highest potential through deliberate practice. At Africa E5 we believe that all scholars can succeed by accompanying them to develop their unique gifts and interests and connect what they learn through deliberate practice to fulfill the purpose for which they were created. As Ralph Marston notes: With enough practice, with enough repetition, anything is possible. It is within this differentiated pedagogic framework that all Africa3H schools are Growth Mindset schools.
- Ecological Citizenship: Education aimed at creating an ecological citizenship can become an effective instrument to build a more welcoming society that is focused on the care of others and of creation. At AfricaE5 our formation will not only be directly to the kids and their families as beneficiaries but also a service to society.
- Real-world Application: One of the limitations of traditional education is that it kept preparing scholars for a world that did not exist. Scholars discover later on in life that the knowledge they acquire in School had very little or no use in real world situations. AfricaE5 schools will help its scholars articulate how the knowledge and skills they master are used to positively impact their community, country, and world especially in the areas of business entrepreneurship.
- Joyful Citizens: We believe that the goal of education is to produce grateful and Joyful citizens. No parent would like to see the son or daughter return home every day sad and bitter. In Afric E5 we are committed to forming the next generation of joyful fire filled kids who will find learning exciting and school fun. Joy is the inheritance of all God’s covenant children. At AfricaE5 it is our vision to bring up God’s joyful citizens by accompanying them to experience the Joyful fire of God’s love in their lives while living a life of gratitude, appreciation and Joyful praise. We will train our kids and students each day to notice life’s goodness and to acknowledge God as the source of it all.
- Service to the Community: Educational research today recognizes the central dimension of service to others and the community as a tool and as an end of education itself. This finding is central to AfricaE5 Educational philosophy. Service learning and volunteerism will play an important role in the forming of our scholars so that they can connect their Head, Heart and Hands as well. The pupils of our schools will be expected to do a set number of hours of service learning and volunteerism per month and term because we believe that through this method of learning skills are transmitted and acquired, relationships are built which will enhance peace amongst God’s children. We can point to this process as a development from education to service to education as service in which our pupils are both the way and the goal of educating.
