The development of western education in Kenya is the responsibility of the Christian missionaries. The missionaries belonged to different church organization from Europe. The arrived into the country we now call Kenya from two different directions. They came in from the coast of Mombasa in the east and from Uganda from the west.
Those missionaries who came in from the east were responsible for the establishment of the mission stations and schools from Mombasa, the coast region and the central region in kenya. And those who came from the west were responsible for the mission stations and schools in Nyanza and the western province in western Kenya.
Although Portuguese introduced Christianity at the Kenyan coast as early as 16th century, it did not take root until the coming of missionaries 200 years later. Two important missionaries were responsible for the introduction of Christianity at the coast. These were Ludwig Kraft and the John Rebman.
The two missionaries belonged to the C.M.S ( church Mission Society). They arrived in Kenya at the coast of Mombasa in 1840. They were on a missionary expedition by the C.M.S. They established schools in Mombasa and Rabai. But, they did not stay at the coast for long. This was due to the fact that Christianity was not well received at the coast.
There are two main reason why Christianity was not well received at the coast. These were:
That the Africans at the coast were not ready to accept the new culture and abandon theirs.
That, the coastal region of Kenya had been under Islamic influence already over 800 years. Therefore the Islam saw the arrival of Christianity as arrival.
Therefore, for the two reasons, we still find that Christianity is in the minority at the coast.
After the establishment of the colonial rule in 1895, and the building of the Uganda railway between 1895 and 1901, Christian activities by the missionaries from Europe begun moving up-country from the coast.
In that connection, we find the following missionary developments:
-The church of Scotland (SCM) moved from Mombasa to Kibwezi and then to kikuyu in central Kenya where they established a station in 1898. From kikuyu this missionary organization moved to Tumutumu in Nyeri and then to Chogoria in Meru.
-On the other hand, the church mission society (CMS), founded stations at Kabete, Waithaga, Kalulua, Mahiga and in Embu. This was between 1903-1910.
-At the same time, the United Methodist Church moved further inland to Meru
-African Inland Mission (AIM), established stations at Kagundo, Kijabe, Githuma and at Kinyona.
-By 1910, the Catholic Holy ghost Fathers set up stations at Kabaa, Kilungu, Nairobi and Kiambu
-Consolata Catholic Mission went to Nyeri and Meru regions.
-The picture of activities of the missionaries on the western part of Kenya was an off-shoot of the church missionary establishment from Uganda
-By 1910, the CMS had established stations at, Maseno, Butere, and Ng’iya
-At the same time, the Mill Hill Mission (MHM) ESTABLISHED SECTIONS ATA Yala, Mumias, Mugumu, Nyahururu and at Asumbi \
-The Seventh Day Adventists SDA had set stations at Gendia, Kamagambo and Nyamechwa
-And the Friends African Mission got stations at Kaimosi and their headquarters in 1902.
-As the Christian missionaries made inroads into the interior of the country establishing churches and schools, the Islamic arrivers were doing the same but a long the line of up-coming centres. This is why up to present times we find Koranic schools in the urban centres only. But because Islamic schools dwelt on the religious matters of the faith a alone, they did not make much impressions to Africans of the interior.
The central activities of the Christian missionaries were made up of three parts. These were:
-The church
-The hospital
-The Schools
The concern of this text is with the schools and educational development as an activity of Christian missionaries at the beginning of the century. Therefore, it is at this point that we turn our full attention to the development of education in Kenya and its role which the missionaries played at the time in laying of the foundation of the type of education that now stands as Kenya’s school system of education.
After establishing mission stations as we have noted here above, the various missionary organizations now begun to scramble for spheres of influence in the same way as that of Berlin conference. Their commodities of trade in scramble was the converts. The belief of all the missionaries with regard to the Africans was that they were pagans who had no idea of Godliness.
The missionaries regarded African as pagans, uncivilized, backward and uncultured or they saw Africans as people without culture. Therefore, the approach of Christian missionaries was that they provide education to the Africans such that through that education the missionaries can be able to remove these bad elements, and thus make the African, Christian and hence, civilized.
It was for this reason that education of the time was predominantly, religious. In this form of education, the lives of the upright and holy were highlighted and were frequently made reference from the time to time so that they may become example for emulation. Actual teaching in the schools was in the basis 3rs (reading, writing and arithmetic)
The 3rs were not taught as a base for further learning. The only objective for their being taught was to enable the Africans:
-To read the Bible
-To be able to propagate the gospel
-To be able to help win other Africans to the church.
The next step in missionary education was the industrial and technical education. This was second to religion because it was meant to discipline Africans by removing laziness so as to make them hard workers. This was designed to make the African into a better worker not an artisan.
The colonial government did not particularly favour the kind of education given to the Africans at the time where religion was predominant. Generally the government supported the efforts of missionaries to try and educate the Africans. But the government particularly favoured the industrial education which was offered by missionaries schools. From the mid 1910, the government instituted system of grant-in-aid to assist those mission schools which offered acceptable technical education.. At the same time, missionaries were members of the education commission right from the first education commission in Kenya in 1909.
However, the education for Africans on the education of Africans as organized by European missionaries was that of indifference, hostile and apathetic. The reason of this attitude included the following:
The missionaries preached against African culture
The parents wanted their children to continue helping with the family chores
Manual work in mission schools took more time than classroom work
The Africans did not want to just serve as handworkers
In order to overcome this obstacle, the government and the missionaries decided to use the chiefs. They made sure that all sons of chiefs and their headmen went to school first. Then, they went round homes faring everybody else to the same. This approach produced positive results. These results came when those who had gone to school came out and were employed in European government offices, missionary offices and on the farms.
These people looked and behaved differently and this became an encouragement to the others to go to school.
Titany answered the question on August 30, 2021 at 12:41