ADAPTATION OF THE PENN SCHOOL 
 METHODS TO EDUCATION IN SOUTI 
 
 AFRICA • BY DR. CHARLES T. LORAM 
 
 -- 
 
 MEMBER OF THE NATIVE AFFAIRS CCMMiSSION 
 OF THE UNION OF SOUTH AFRICA • FORMERLY 
 INSPECTOR OF NATIVE EDUCATION IN NATAL 
 
 I 
 
 PUBLISHED BY THE PHELPS-STOKES FUND 
 ioi PARK AVE • NEW YORK CITY • APRIL 1927 
 
 
• V; y r; /. RS* •’ r" ; 
 
 
 
 
 Digitized by the Internet Archive 
 in 2018 with funding from 
 Columbia University Libraries 
 
 https://archive.org/details/adaptationofpennOOIora 
 
NATIVE AFFAIRS COMMISSION 
 PRETORIA • UNION OF SOUTH AFRICA 
 TO MT COLLEAGUES IN AFRICAN EDUCATION: 
 
 THE SCHOOL AS SOCIAL CENTRE 
 
 ABOUT the middle of October, 1926, I had the 
 f-\ pleasure of spending a few days at Penn Nor- 
 -L JC mal, Industrial and Agricultural School on St. 
 Helena Island, Beaufort County, South Carolina. I had 
 not been there very long before I saw that this was the 
 school which, more than any other I had seen, exempli¬ 
 fied my ideal for African education, with the school as 
 the centre and chief factor of village development. I 
 was delighted when I learned that Miss Rossa B. 
 Cooley, the Principal of the School, had written a 
 charming account of the work of Penn School which 
 had been published under the attractive title The 
 Homes of the Freed. 
 
 Knowing from experience how anxious African edu¬ 
 cators are to improve their schools and how competent 
 they are to act upon suggestions, I approached those 
 good friends of Africa, the Phelps-Stokes Fund, and 
 asked them to help us again by distributing a number of 
 copies of these books in Africa. Not only did Dr. Phelps 
 Stokes and Dr. Jesse Jones agree at once but they de¬ 
 cided to distribute along with this volume certain books 
 on allied subjects, and asked me to write a short account 
 of the possible application of the lines of work in the 
 Penn School to African schools. 
 
 I found this a more difficult task than I had antici¬ 
 pated for there is really no Penn “system” of education. 
 There is at St. Helena Island a full appreciation of the 
 social values of education and an atmosphere of sincere 
 but simple Christian cooperation, but there is no techni¬ 
 cal method which can be easily translated from America 
 to Africa. The book with its wonderful story, delight¬ 
 fully told, will have its influence on all readers. In com¬ 
 menting upon it I feel like one who tries to paint the 
 lily. However, a promise is a promise and must be kept. 
 
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Some Comparison of Conditions 
 
 Before attempting to say how far the Penn outlook 
 on education and the Penn methods of approach are ap¬ 
 plicable to African conditions, it seems necessary to 
 make clear certain similarities and unlikenesses in the 
 conditions which obtain in the two continents. 
 
 The first difference is, I think, that the Negroes of 
 America are Christians, inured to regular work, accus¬ 
 tomed to daily and even hourly contact with the white 
 man, owners or renters of their own clearly defined por¬ 
 tions of land, and individualistic in their social life. 
 Conditions generally in Africa at present are, I suppose, 
 the exact opposite of these. But it is important to re¬ 
 member that there are already in many parts of Africa 
 localities where two or three generations of Christian 
 civilised Africans have produced conditions not unlike 
 those of St. Helena Island. It would be easier and more 
 economical of effort to begin to work on Penn lines in 
 these communities first. 
 
 A second difference which may make the Penn system 
 difficult of transplantation to Africa is the tendency on 
 the part of the controllers of education in some parts of 
 the continent, be they Government or Mission Council, 
 to prevent or hamper new and individualistic work by 
 hard and fast restrictions and regulations. It would, for 
 example, be difficult to conduct a “Penn School for all 
 Ages” in a country where pupils over sixteen years of 
 age are not admitted to the primary school. Further, 
 head teachers, where compelled to work to and to be 
 examined on departmental syllabuses and time tables, 
 will not dare to set their pupils to work on the “Home 
 Acre” or take them to a village “Clean-up Week.” One 
 remembers in this connection the excuse given by the 
 Native girls who left their dormitory in an untidy con¬ 
 dition: They had no time to clean up because they had 
 to go to their hygiene lesson! It will, however, be found 
 that Government Departments and controlling Mission 
 Boards are susceptible to reason (though this is denied 
 by some) and that permission to do the kind of work 
 attempted at Penn School can generally be obtained. 
 
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Long experience of the ways of Governments and Mis¬ 
 sion Boards suggests that permission for the experiment 
 be obtained beforehand and that the proposals submitted 
 be made to look as much like a syllabus as possible! 
 
 A third feature which has helped in the success of 
 Penn School is the fact that the principals are women of 
 breeding and culture, trained by the great and good 
 Frissell of Hampton, and loved, befriended, and helped 
 by some of the choicest spirits in the United States. The 
 elements for all this helpful support are with us in 
 Africa also, though not yet to the same degree as at 
 Penn. We can, however, emulate the Penn School mid¬ 
 wives and improve ourselves by study, practice and 
 prayer. Luckily for us, the Vacation Course or Summer 
 School is becoming a feature of the work of African 
 Departments of Education. Mission Councils or Boards 
 could help us all by making it possible for their teachers, 
 white as well as black, to attend these schools. It is only 
 the teacher in the outstation who knows fully the down¬ 
 ward pull of the African environment and the need for 
 help and inspiration such as the Vocation Course can 
 give. 
 
 In attempting to apply the Penn or any other “sys¬ 
 tem” of education to Africa, we need to remember that 
 “the letter killeth but the spirit giveth life.” Some, per¬ 
 haps many, of the conditions so graphically described 
 by Miss Cooley do not apply to Africa as we know it 
 today. But it will be recognized that, mutatis mutandis , 
 the work of the Penn School as set out both in Miss 
 Cooley’s book and in the school report can afford us 
 many suggestions for our work in Africa. Some of these 
 may be named. 
 
 Suggestions Applicable to Africa 
 
 (i) The work of Penn School is in daily and even 
 hourly touch with the life of the island community. 
 That this is the case can be seen at once by reference to 
 page 16 of the report, A Rural Experiment , sent with 
 this letter. There will be found an account of twenty- 
 eight committees which bind the school to the life of the 
 
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community. It will easily be seen how real the school 
 lessons on nature study and elementary agriculture are 
 when part of the teaching of these subjects is done at the 
 homes of the pupils. Domestic science and hygiene les¬ 
 sons take on a new significance when the bigger girls 
 prepare and cook the midday meal for the day pupils 
 and when the teachers and pupils organise and carry out 
 a “Clean-up Week” in the neighbouring village. Home 
 making becomes much more than a text book matter 
 when in these school grounds there is a “Better Home” 
 managed, and at times lived in, by the pupils of the 
 school. 
 
 I know of native institutions so fortunately situated 
 that every one of the twenty-eight Penn activities could 
 be carried out. I do not know of a single school where 
 some at least of these community activities cannot be put 
 into practice if the teachers believe sufficiently in them. 
 
 I suppose it is because of European tradition that so 
 many of our schoolhouses are more or less isolated 
 units, situated far from the centres of village activity 
 and open only for a few hours a day. And some of our 
 teachers are “nine o’clock to three” men and women, 
 who grumble if called upon to do anything more than 
 classroom teaching. “The worst of this place,” said the 
 principal of one of the most “successful” (from the 
 examination result standpoint) institutions in Africa, “is 
 that the ignorant villagers so often bother us with re¬ 
 quests for help that we cannot get on with our work.” 
 “Thank God for the influenza epidemic of 1918,” said 
 another with a wider outlook, “for it was in visiting the 
 homes of the stricken people that our pupils first learned 
 the real meaning of community service.” 
 
 (2) Penn is primarily a day school although boarders 
 are taken. There is a daily relationship between the school 
 and the homes of the pupils. In Africa, the tendency is 
 still to make all but the most elementary schools board¬ 
 ing institutions. The reasons are, of course, obvious. The 
 gap between life at the Christian school with all it stands 
 for, and life at the heathen home with all it entails, is 
 too great to be bridged. If the young plant is to develop 
 
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it has to be transplanted. It may be, however, that we 
 have regarded the gap as greater than it really is. It may 
 be that there are some things in the heathen home life 
 that we should do well to cherish. In any case, if we are 
 to make the idea of community service a working reality 
 it seems desirable to admit day pupils to our boarding 
 schools and to develop the day school plan as soon as 
 possible. 
 
 (3) How can we develop sympathetic relations be¬ 
 tween the community and our African schools? First, by 
 the location of our schools in the centres of population. 
 Let us so plan that there may be a classroom in every 
 school or a hut which may also be used as a meeting 
 room and a kitchen for sewing and cooking. 
 
 In the second place, let us train our teachers to in¬ 
 clude the life of the community in their ideals, both in 
 our normal schools and in Vacation Courses. If possible, 
 let the teachers be of the same tribe and language as the 
 children they teach. Require them to live in the villages 
 where their schools are located, and teach them to re¬ 
 gard themselves as shepherds and not as hirelings. Give 
 them a status and a responsibility in the Mission Coun¬ 
 cils and let them regard themselves really as co-workers 
 with the missionary. 
 
 Thirdly, let the curriculum be set up after a survey 
 of the immediate needs of the people. Let not European 
 tradition dominate too much. Which is really more im¬ 
 portant in the African villages today—practical hygiene 
 or the ability to read? Elementary agriculture or geog¬ 
 raphy? Wise recreation or arithmetic? No one can dog¬ 
 matise on these points. Procure a copy of Dr. Jesse 
 Jones’ wise little book on The Four Essentials of Edu¬ 
 cation and apply those world-wide principles to the 
 school situation in your midst. 
 
 Encourage in every way the interest and cooperation 
 of the parents of your children. Tolerate and even en¬ 
 courage the gaping visitor to your school. Create school 
 committees including the missionary, the parents and 
 the teacher. Make use of a generous emulation; give a 
 flag to the school with the cleanest village, another to 
 
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the school with the best home gardens, and so on. Do 
 not neglect regular and sympathetic supervision—the 
 very life blood of schools and especially of community 
 schools. 
 
 (4) Penn has a host of wise and generous friends. I 
 met Miss Cooley first at a fashionable summer resort— 
 the guest of a man honoured throughout the States. 
 Here she was making friends for her school. Look at 
 page 58 of the report. Take a single item, “Income Con¬ 
 tributions for general purposes, $21,143.32.” Again, on 
 page 60, “Special Donations received towards lifting of 
 debt, $14,400.00.” Look at the buildings and the equip¬ 
 ment. 
 
 I doubt if we African educators do all we could to 
 make friends for our work. Perhaps we are more shy 
 than Americans—perhaps we have not such faith in our¬ 
 selves and our work. I doubt if we do all we could to 
 enlist the help of the native chief, to say nothing of 
 the European trader and settler. Why not let one or two 
 of our trained girls help the settler’s wife in the kitchen 
 or nursery, and encourage our young men to work on 
 the settler’s plantation, provided we are satisfied regard¬ 
 ing the moral and material result? Let us not hold our¬ 
 selves too aloof from the settler and the trader. 
 
 Finally, do we present our work to the world at large 
 in the best way? The reports of the Phelps-Stokes Com¬ 
 missions show what splendid work is being done, and 
 yet I doubt if Africa has published anything so attrac¬ 
 tive as The Homes of the Freed or A Rural School Ex¬ 
 periment. It is not a case of boasting. There is not a trace 
 of that in either of these volumes. If, as I believe, there 
 is a moral obligation to be intelligent I see no reason 
 why we should not try this way among others to win 
 friends for our work in Africa. 
 
 C. T. LORAM. 
 
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