A real education for life

by Miriam Noyes

Helene Bengi (r) is a lead literacy teacher at the Lemba Matete Baptist Church

“Do you see that girl?” Mama Helene asked.  “Her friend brought her.  She’s a high school graduate, in our beginning reading class.  And she’s not alone.  We have several of them.”  Helene and Rose, our literacy coordinator, were talking in front of the Lemba-Matete Baptist church during our recent teacher training seminar there.

Over the years I’ve become aware of the often low levels of literacy among girls in rural schools.  I put it down to environment: there just isn’t that much incentive to read in villages, and girls often don’t hope for lives different from that of their illiterate mothers.  But my friends in Kinshasa protest that schools in Kinshasa aren’t any better.  In fact, they argue, the lively urban setting serves up many more distractions, wooing students away from serious studies.

In 2011 I was visiting Kinshasa as news flashed across the city: 100% of Kinshasa seniors had passed the final exams!  That was one huge city-wide graduation party!  Then the facts started to trickle out : there had been a massive pay-off.  Nearly all the high schools (except official Catholic schools) had participated in the corruption.  Reality came down hard on the celebrating students.  Various institutions announced that they would no longer accept Kinshasa high school diplomas.

Some families pay to have their daughters promoted . . . all the way through their school career.  Other girls pay in other currency: sexual harassment is rampant in schools, and someone I know speaks of “sexually transmitted grades”.  Imagine completing 12 years of school and still not being able to read.

Eventually, young people, like the young woman Mama Helene spoke of, learn that a diploma without the learning to go with it is almost worthless.  That’s when our literacy classes start to sound interesting.

There at the Lemba Matete church the classes are bustling all morning every day, Monday through Saturday, on the students’ insistence.  And all of the students I saw were young, both girls and guys.

Literacy classrooms are simple, protection from sun and rain.  They serve double duty as Sunday School classrooms.

To meet the demand, the church mounted a special offering campaign and built several small classrooms.  They’re bare-bones, but that hardly matters to the young people crowding in demanding an education.  When we interrupted their regular schedule to use their classrooms for our teacher training seminar the kids protested.

Fancy classrooms are much less important that motivated learners and dedicated, creative teachers.

So what makes these kids different?  To begin with, they have made the decision to learn.  They’re tested to find their true level and set at ease with other kids at the same level. In the classes they get individualized attention to deal with whatever problem they have and make sure they’re learning the material.  The education is competency-oriented and practical.  And it includes the encouragement of prayer and learning to read the Bible.

How does the church benefit? They now have classrooms for Sunday school and small meeting places for other groups when classes aren’t in session.  Some literacy students get drawn into church activities and become church members. The church is developing the reputation for caring in the community, a place where you can go for help.  And church members get great help for their own kids, paving the way for a better education.  The good students who are canny use these classes to get better yet.

These days the teachers and students at Lemba-Matete Baptist church are dreaming about adding vocational training classes to further help young people, in a city of high unemployment.

The guiding verse of the Congolese Baptist literacy work is “My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge.” Hosea 4:6.   In a country where that is particularly true*, churches like the Lemba-Matete Baptist Church are making a difference.

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* Despite its enormous, varied mineral wealth, DR Congo is at the bottom of nearly every  human development index.