Pastoralist Education

Nomadic

Nomadic is a local NGO that is based in Wajir district, Northeastern Kenya. Nomadic is one of EPAG Kenya’s local partners and they are responsible for delivering pastoralist education work funded by Comic Relief through EPAG UK.

Nomadic adopt an approach to pastoralist education that stems from the belief that pastoralists are knowledgeable, their livelihood system is productive and their culture is linked to their relationship with their religion, their animals and their environment.

The essential issues that have been raised by pastoralists in terms of supporting pastoralist education is that the curriculum of any teaching is linked to their lifestyle and culture, that the subjects are useful to them as pastoralists and that teaching fits into their daily schedules and seasonal patterns of mobility. The key benefits for supporting pastoralist education are:

 

SPIRITUAL WELLBEING: Good mental health and emotional wellbeing, especially for those that have been affected by war and displacement. Dugsi teachers provide immediate spiritual guidance, emotional support and the stability of ritual to children from as little as 4 years old.

 

ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT: Additional training and education to diversify pastoralist livelihoods into new areas. Support pastoralists to be inventive, adapting and diversifying their businesses to meet growing economic challenges. Provide tools to innovate and strengthen their livelihoods and find alternatives.

 

ENVIRONMENTAL SUSTAINABILITY: The entire family participates in managing their fragile ecosystem.

 

Nomadic project work aims to ensure a life long learning approach to education with the whole family learning together. They are developing flexible learning with mobile schools for mobile people and supporting the training of useful skills for pastoralist families such as governance, public participation, land and political rights. Read more about Nomadic.

Pastoralists own views about education and school

 

"It’s better to divide our children between different activities – between pastoralism and education and jobs."

 

"We are still pastoralists. So, I think we should send some of our children to school and some to look after the animals. In that way, our culture can survive while, at the same time, some are being educated and getting work and sending money to help us. In that way, we are spreading our risks."

 

"I have six children and decided to send three for livestock-rearing and three for education."

 

Sourced from the IDS Research report 56 'Vulnerable Livelihoods in the Somali Region of Ethiopia' section 5 Conclusion & Implications for Policy, Somali Attitudes to future of pastoralism p.164 -166. Stephen Devereaux 2006..