Part 1 of The Radical Shift argued that in order to fulfill its Vision 2020 strategy, and successfully develop its people, Rwanda must prioritize quality values based education and view the local school as a cornerstone for community development.  Unfortunately, the history of education in Rwanda has been dominated by exclusion, division, and mistrust.  Even a brief look at the history of formal education in Rwanda from colonial times until present day demonstrated schools have largely failed to reach their potential because they have been dominated by a scarcity mentality.

Part 2 of this entry argues that a radical shift from scarcity to abundance in Rwandan schools is highly necessary, and despite Rwanda’s difficult past, it is also possible.  In spite of the current situation, there is already a subtle shift happening in Rwanda presently that may yet cause schools across the country to become beacons of light in their communities.  This shift is happening as a growing number of school leaders, teachers, and parents embrace their critical role in the future of their country.

There are a small, but intrepid, group of educators who believe their circumstances should not determine their commitment. They believe they have a choice between abundance and scarcity, and they intentionally choose abundance. These educators work in the same circumstances as their colleagues. They too have inherited the colonial legacy of top-down authoritarian leadership and rote-based education, and they have to grapple with the insidious role many schools had in spreading division and mistrust prior to the 1994 genocide. They teach in schools that are overcrowded, under-supported, and under-resourced. For this privilege, they also receive poor compensation and little appreciation from the wider society. Yet they still choose abundance.

The shift is being led by men and women like Fred Buyinza—current Chairman of the Association of Committed Teachers (ACT) Rwanda—who believes “teachers are like gold to the nation” and regularly asks his fellow teachers the question: “What do we have in our hands?” These men and women recognize that good leadership matters and they continue to explore the type of leadership required to transform their communities. They refuse to settle for mere survival because they want their communities to thrive.  The leadership they are demonstrating can be called Abundant Leadership (For other relevant examples see Kirsten Lake’s recent story on Star Leaders or Jeff Komant’s post from 2010 on Mustard Seed Academy).    

Abundant Leadership can be defined as serving a community by helping them identify what they already have and connecting those community assets to accomplish a common vision.  This definition is based on principles drawn from Servant Leadership, Asset Based Community Development (ABCD), and Rwandan culture, like service, stewardship, empowerment, trust, community engagement, collective effort, and common vision.  In the context of Rwandan schools, the Abundant Leader seeks to move beyond a deficient or basic education (scarcity) towards a Vibrant School Community (abundance).

For an Abundant Leader, motivation and credibility do not come from title or position, but rather from a deep love and passion for their community and a desire to see positive change that will benefit all members. An Abundant Leader has a generous heart, a keen mind, and open hands. Their leadership is rooted in the view that leadership begins with service, that a transformed and vibrant community is possible, that beauty can truly come from ashes (Isaiah 61:3 NIV), that a community has inherent strengths and abilities (assets), and that the success of others enhances—and does not negate—their own success.  The Abundant Leader is primarily a servant, a connector, and a catalyst.

Abundant Leadership has the attitude and spirit embodied in Isaiah 43:18-19, when God encourages his people Israel with a command and a promise: “Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past. See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the desert and streams in the wasteland (NIV).” Abundant Leadership is infectious. When practiced well, it can transform regular men and women into powerful agents for positive change. This is because Abundant Leadership has a multiplying effect, inspiring those who witness it to lead in a similar way, and extracting dignity, self-worth, and pride from a people who have only known despair, futility, and fatalism.

Since the Abundant Leader recognizes the critical difference his or her community will make in implementing positive change, they start the school improvement process by seeking to understand what the community already has (its assets), connecting together relevant individuals, associations, and institutions, and utilizing these assets and connections to move forward toward a common vision for school improvement. Only once the community has already started down the path is it ready for outside partnership and support.

What would be the impact on Rwandan schools if they adopted Abundant Leadership and based their improvement efforts from what they already had? What difference would it make if the people who make up those schools communities—teachers, students, and parents—had dignity, a sense of calling, and a realisation of what they had to contribute in the process?

I believe they would become communities composed of citizens and neighbours, rather than consumers and clients. Ownership of change would be shared and the responsibility for ongoing improvement would be guarded by the many, rather than the few. Others could partner with the confidence that their investment would be sustainable, fit with local vision, and would not build long term dependency.  This is the type of change The Wellspring Foundation longs to support in the Rwandan context, and perhaps beyond.

In Part 3 of The Radical Shift I will get highly practical and discuss five practices of Abundant Leadership that can serve as a starting point for making a radical shift from scarcity to abundance and help create Vibrant School Communities.  They include (a) developing a heart for community service, (b) helping schools discover shared values, (c) crafting a common vision, (d) recognizing and leveraging community assets, and (e) building a culture of accountability.  It is my hope that The Wellspring Foundation can begin to integrate these approaches even more meaningfully as we seek to identify Abundant Leaders and help them and their communities to thrive.

I recently completed my Final Paper for my Masters in Leadership: Helping Rwandan Schools Become Vibrant Communities: The Power of Abundant Leadership. Its key determination is that Rwandan educators need to help their schools make the radical shift from a scarcity mentality to an abundance mentality, so they can become truly Vibrant Communities. School leaders need to develop a heart to serve their school community, help their community discover its shared values, and work together to create and fulfill a common vision.  This vision needs to start from what a community already has (its assets) and be fuelled by trust and accountability, a process called Abundant Leadership.

Throughout Rwanda, the local school is a cornerstone for community development. Nearly 45% of Rwandans are currently under age 15; this next generation have deposited their hopes and dreams for a better future with their school leaders and teachers—relying on their knowledge, their guidance, and their leadership to help them succeed. Most Rwandans recognize, as EF Schumacher did in his brilliant book, Small is Beautiful (1973), that “education is a nation’s greatest resource.”

Unfortunately, education has yet to become Rwanda’s greatest resource because the history of formal education in Rwanda has been dominated by a scarcity mentality. Too often, in Rwanda’s troubled history, schools have instead contributed to exclusion, division, and hatred of the other.  Too often, school have been the place where hopes die and dreams are dashed, and too often, schools have been characterised by mistrust, despondency, and helplessness. Under the Belgian colonial power, education was designed for the few and it made objects out of teachers, students, trustees and parents.  The Belgians focused on educating Tutsi sons of the monarchy—who served as indirect rulers—so they could become capable and loyal administrators for the colonial government. There was little access to higher education. Racist philosophy was written into textbooks and the school curriculum. Leadership was top-down and authoritarian.

After independence in 1961, a Hutu-dominated government took power. The education system and curriculum was largely left intact but many discriminatory policies were reversed to favour the Hutu, and especially those Hutu connected to the political elite. A quota system based primarily on ethnic or regional criteria—rather than merit—determined school placement. In many ways, the problems in the education system mirrored the problems in the wider society (Obura, 2003). Most schools mirrored the growing division in the wider society and when the 1994 genocide erupted, schools became killing fields.

As intellectuals, teachers were specifically targeted during the genocide. Many teachers and students were also perpetrators. In the film, Rwanda: Take Two, young Rwandan poet Eduard (Eddy) Bamporiki recalls his first poem: “If They Hadn’t Been Killed, We Would Be Laughing”.
Written when he was ten years old (he is now 27), the poem details his devastation as a
primary school student upon learning that some of his teachers were responsible for killing their fellow teachers and his classmates, just because they came from a certain ethnic group. “I was distraught,” he recalled. “I never expected a teacher could be killed—teachers were sacred.” When Eddy returned to school he boldly asked his remaining teachers what education they planned to give him now they had destroyed things.

Rwanda has made some significant progress since the genocide in rebuilding school infrastructure, increasing access to education, increasing gender equality in the classroom, extending basic education through Secondary 3, and expanding tertiary education. Despite these gains, the quality of education in Rwandan schools is still low, and they are still characterised by a scarcity mentality of mistrust, despondency, a feeling of deprivation, and low morale. I believe that this can change, and in fact, it is already changing, as growing number of school leaders throughout Rwandan embrace abundance.  In my next blog entry, I will look at specific examples of where this abundant mentality is taking root, explain what Abundant Leadership looks like in the Rwandan school context, and argue why a radical shift from scarcity to abundance is critical if Rwanda is to accomplish its bold vision (Vision 2020) to become a middle income country in one generation.

No one can deny the education system in Rwanda today is burdened by the colonial legacy, the lingering impact of the Genocide, and a lack of funding and resources. Unfortunately, these past and present challenges often serve as convenient excuses for a lack of performance and progress. Rwandan Educational Leaders need to resist the temptation to focus on the negatives in their community, or throw up their hands in despair until they receive outside assistance, and begin seeking ways to mobilize their communities towards shared values and a common vision.

Too often, the impetus for change in Rwandan school communities rests on imposed visions by well intentioned outside aid agencies. As William Easterly recognizes in his book, The White Man’s Burden (2006), well intentioned efforts like the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) that seek to create a cookie cutter formula for poverty alleviations, are doomed to failure no matter how much funding they generate.

Running a non profit, even a small and focused one like Wellspring, is a lot of hard work.  It is very seldom glorious.  But there are moments when all the hard work pays off.  My recent trip to Rwanda full of those moments.   

• Taking part in an assembly with 150 Primary 4 to Primary 6 students and seeing the evidence of their faith and how they ministered to each other was one of those moments.
• Listening to Wellspring Academy students Samantha and Enoch show leadership, welcome guests and speak eloquently about their school at the opening ceremony for the Secondary School was one of those moments.
• Witnessing the Mayor of Kigali break out into joyful and spontaneous song at the opening ceremony for the Secondary School, praising God for what he has accomplished through the Wellspring Academy, was one of those moments.
• Seeing our teacher training team in action, engaging 40 head teachers from the District of Gasabo, in a full day training session designed to help them understand their critical leadership role, was one of those moments.
• Meeting an African American man from Atlanta, GA who had just started a Christian school in Southern Rwanda and found his teachers by contacting Fred Buyinza from ACT Rwanda, was one of those moments.
• Singing together with the new Secondary School students on their first day of school to celebrate that every single one had received Level 1 standing in the national exams, was one of those moments.

I really believe that our work in Rwanda is at a watershed moment.  God is working in the hearts of teachers across this country and lives are being changed.  The government and other organizations are starting to pay attention to Quality of Education issues and acknowledge our organization has the most transformational approach.  I can’t wait to see what other moments are on the horizon as we press forward to make a difference for Christ in Rwanda.

There is no way around it. Sending a container overseas is a lot of work! And Rwanda is about as far away from Vancouver, British Columbia as you can get.

Wellspring just cleared a 40 ft. container for our Secondary School that left port in Vancouver nearly four months ago. It arrived just in time, giving us a few days to outfit our new science building and computer lab, before school starts.

Here are some of the things that happened in order to get this container to Rwanda. As you will see, success required a lot of different people and organizations pitching in at different stages of the journey: