Making Higher Education Count in Sub-Saharan Africa: Lessons from John Dewey’s My Pedagogic Creed

Abstract

The study focuses on strengthening higher education in Sub-Saharan Africa through John Dewey’s My Pedagogic Creed. Many educationists widely admire Dewey’s philosophy of education, yet his enduring message—the inseparable connection between education and society—is often misunderstood. His deep understanding of the connection between the school and the larger social context is relevant to recent efforts by Sub-Saharan African governments to enhance authentic higher education. From the standpoint of Dewey’s fivefold themes—education, school, subject-matter, method, social progress—the study discusses the integration of educational resources for achieving the task of higher education in Sub-Saharan Africa. Though modern theorists may recast Dewey’s pragmatic theory of education, this social critical study proposes that Dewey’s placement of learners at the center of the interaction between the school and society points to a more satisfactory result that could reform higher education in Sub-Saharan Africa.

1. Introduction

As the 21st-century gradually shifts from a manufacturing-based economy to a knowledge-based information economy, higher education is increasingly gaining significance ([1], pp. 6–7). Contemporary societies have high expectations of their higher education system. The practical benefits they anticipate harnessing from higher education include economic, health, and civic engagement. It is claimed that higher education reduces unemployment, offers job security that reduces financial stressors, and a citizenry that cooperates with its government ([2], p. 88; [3], pp. 44–45). Consequently, governments of modern societies continue to invest in higher education.

There has been acute stress on Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) education within higher education around the globe in recent times.¹ The desire for STEM education emerges from the quest to train individuals to prepare for the challenges of the 21st-century. While some of these problems are known, others are largely unknown. For example, terminal diseases such as Ebola and Coronavirus and socioeconomic issues such as poverty, governance, and climate change threaten human life. On the phase of both known and unknown threats to human life and survival, higher education is expected to invest learners with the capacity to understand the volatile conditions of the 21st-century and be competent to deal effectively with these challenges. Higher education is expected to introduce learners to a whole range of organic and inorganic experiences to create new or improve upon existing measures for the survival of the glocal society.

John Dewey’s pragmatic theory of education becomes relevant at this point. His theory broadly connects learners with society. Learners cannot deal with the challenges of the 21st-century if they continue to receive the educational contents that are mutually exclusive from society. This means that both the society and the school must have a common purpose. John Dewey’s My Pedagogic Creed shows how society and schools can establish and pursue a common purpose—assisting learners to understand and manage their complex social experiences.

Recent educationists have recast Dewey’s pragmatism into various learning models known as student-centered learning. The shift from the teacher’s desire and purpose in the curriculum to learners permeates these learning models. Usually, teachers encourage learners to be part of the educational process and inspire them towards leading various learning activities in the school. These learning experiences are a set of “…collaborative activities, goal-driven tasks, intellectual discovery, activities that heighten thinking, and activities that provide practice in learning skills” to learners ([4], p. 420). The strong emphasis on the learner’s independence in the learning process often overshadows the interrelatedness between the school and the larger society. While Dewey expected learners to decide the contents and method of their education, he hoped their engagement with the larger society would create a mutual context by which they could determine the task of education. This interrelatedness between society and the school is the basis of Dewey’s pragmatic theory of education. However, modern education theorists seem to have pushed away from this foundation.

The thrust of this study is that Dewey’s pragmatic theory of education may assist the 21st-century educationist in achieving the critical task of higher education—investing learners with the capacity and skill in dealing effectively with the known and unknown challenges of the 21st-century. In doing this, the study examines Dewey’s fivefold themes in My Pedagogic Creed. With these themes at the background of succeeding analysis, the article discusses and draws out implications of Dewey’s view for higher education in Sub-Saharan Africa. The present study is a connected social criticism of higher education in Sub-Saharan Africa, and it relies substantially on Dewey’s views and other secondary sources that either praise or criticize his pragmatic notions in My Pedagogic Creed. The author’s participation, observations, and desire for the relevance of higher education in 21st-century Sub-Saharan Africa is the backdrop for this discourse.

2. Higher education in Sub-Saharan Africa

Sub-Saharan Africa comprises 48 countries, with a population of about 1 billion ([5], n.p.). Higher education in Sub-Saharan Africa continues to expand ([6], p. 1). For example, student enrollment increased from 5.9 million in 2010 to 8.3 million in 2019 ([7], n.p.). A significant enrollment increment was recorded in Mauritius, Cape Verde, Botswana, South Africa, Namibia, Sudan, Seychelles, Senegal, Congo D.R., Ghana, Guinea, Cameroun, Togo, Nigeria, Lesotho, Kenya, and Benin ([5], n.p.). The general expectation that higher education would lead to the development of the Sub-Saharan African region is the basis for this expansion ([8], p. 174). Higher education is expected to produce competent, highly skilled labor who perform various roles in significant sectors in these developing economies ([6], p. 6).

However, a general doubt exists on the quality of higher education in Sub-Saharan Africa ([9], p. 75). Studies show that deficit research capacity, poor quality of university professors, lacking educational resources/facilities, and disconnection between industry and higher education institutions are some of the factors that impede the quality of higher education in Sub-Saharan Africa ([10], pp. 20–21; [11], pp. 13–14; [8], p. 174). Many governments have adopted various strategies to improve the quality of higher education ([12], p. 66). The African Graduate Fellowship Program (AFGRAD; 1963–1990); the Advanced Training for Leadership and Skills Program (ATLAS; 1991–2003); the Collaborative Research Support Programs (CRSPs) or the “Feed the Future Innovation Labs for Collaborative Research,” 2013; and the Partnership for Higher Education in Africa (PHEA) are some of the strategies for strengthening higher education in Sub-Saharan Africa. Agenda 2063 ([13], p.12), approved by 54 African countries, is a recent measure to improve higher education in the region through a Pan-African E University that enhances

…human capital, science and technology and innovation through increasing access to tertiary and continuing education in Africa by capitalizing on the digital revolution and global knowledge; reaching large numbers of students and professionals in multiple sites simultaneously by developing relevant and high quality curriculum and ensure the prospect African student a guaranteed access to the University from anywhere in the world and anytime (24 hours a day, 7 days a week).

Some of these approaches allow the private sector to invest in higher education. For example, the private sector involvement in higher education in Ghana and Ethiopia is 15%, 20% in Kenya, and about 36.7% in Nigeria and Senegal ([11], p. 13). It is estimated that these investments and measures will produce laudable improvement in the quality of higher education in Sub-Saharan Africa. However, the nature of higher education, study environment, curriculum, method, and social engagement of higher education institutions in Sub-Saharan Africa reveal a shortfall.

Since their establishment, higher education in Sub-Saharan Africa has been used as a tool towards a particular end. Higher education established the avenue by which colonial worldview was transmitted from the colonialists to their subjects during colonial times ([14], p. 36). Higher education institutions produced a workforce needed to keep the colonial operations active ([9], p. 75). In postcolonial Africa, higher education continues to be a tool to socioeconomic ends. Higher education is expected to produce a skilled/professional workforce to drive economic and infrastructure development. Also, higher education has the task of recasting the African identity such that the African worldview can be sustained in an increasingly globalized world ([13], p. 2). Further, it is expected that higher education will produce a citizenry that understands their civic duties and promote social cohesion ([13], p. 2).

Unfortunately, higher education’s socioeconomic return has not been satisfactory in the Sub-Saharan African region. An underlining factor is a critical gap between higher education and the larger community. The disengagement between higher education and society has existed right from the inception of higher education institutions. Colonialists’ purpose for higher education was external to the Sub-Saharan African society ([9], p. 75). African culture was disregarded, so no connection existed between higher education and the socioeconomic demands of the social context that hosted higher education institutions ([14], p. 37). The result was the disparity between higher education products and existing markets/industries in society. Academics and corporate players have varying views on higher education, employment requirements, and students’ attitude and abilities for the labor market. The widening gap between higher education institutions and the larger society means that little connection exists between higher education and the developmental goals and strategies of Sub-Saharan African countries. Presently, industrial support for higher education in Sub-Saharan Africa is either negligible or non-existing, leading to incongruence between higher education products and corporate requirements ([6], p. 24). This disparity set the stage for the migration of skilled force from Sub-Saharan Africa to mostly Western destinations. Accordingly, higher education holds little relevance for African societies ([14], p. 41).

Recent developments have positioned knowledge and information at the center of socioeconomic growth ([15], p. 1). Production factors and economic capital have been redefined. This positioning means that higher education is needed to drive socioeconomic developments by producing a labor force that can effectively contribute to national and international growth. There is a need for a practical reconceptualization of higher education in Sub-Saharan African societies to reposition higher education institutions to satisfy the demands of a knowledge-based information economy. Dewey’s proposal of educational reformation could aid the reconstruction of higher education in Sub-Saharan Africa to meet the varied demands of a knowledge-based information economy.

3. Dewey’s fivefold themes in My Pedagogic Creed

John Dewey was born in Burlington, Vermont, USA, on 20th October 1859. His father was Archibald Sprague Dewey, and his mother was Lucina Artemisia Rich. He attended the University of Vermont and John Hopkins University. Dewey was a leading figure in pragmatic philosophy and a significant voice in educational reforms in 20th-century America. His pragmatic philosophy underlines his books on education: My Pedagogic Creed (1897); The Primary-Education Fetish (1898); The School and Society (1900); The Child of the Curriculum (1902); Democracy and Education (1916); Schools of Tomorrow (1915); and a co-authored book Experience and Education (1938). His most famous book is My Pedagogic Creed.

Writing at the turn of the 20th-century, when the task of education was to produce labor to serve the needs of industries, Dewey challenged the current education structure. His model focused on the interaction between the school and society as the entwined focus of authentic education. Consensus on the literature on Dewey links him to Hegel’s non-idealistic influences. However, he deferred in his quest for non-reductionist psychological concepts on social, mind, and consciousness. Also, Darwin’s Origin of Species likely influenced Dewey’s thoughts on progressive education. There is a strong connection between William James and John Dewey. Dewey advanced concepts on pragmatism that James initiated. His “melioristic, pragmatic account of social practice; his emphasis upon the importance of habits in organized human life; his presentation of the role of philosophy as a means of improving daily life; his recognition of the social nature of the self; and his call for a rejection of religious traditions and institutions in favor of an emphasis upon religious experience” are all indications of themes from James’ philosophical thoughts ([16], p. 614).

3.1 What is education?

Dewey sees education as a conglomeration of the “social consciousness” of either the whole human race or a specific aspect ([17], p. 3). All community members are introduced to this consciousness from birth, and it continues through their adult lives. The daily exchange of ideas, concepts, and emotions are some of the ways by which members are educated. Broadly, these processes are unconscious. “Through this unconscious education, the individual comes to share in the intellectual and moral resources” of his or her society ([17], p. 3). Also, the individual inherits and contributes to this legacy of education within the community. Thus, Dewey suggests that formal education is either the organization of the legacy of socialization to make learners understand and participate in it or a systematic process by which the various elements of the legacy of education are categorized to point individuals to specific directions in the ongoing process of civilization.

Dewey believes formal education has two dimensions—psychological and sociological. The psychological aspect focuses on developing the individual’s internal competencies—the individual’s unique way of thinking, behaving, and feeling. An advanced version of these competencies provides a self-understanding that translates self-preservation into sociability. The individual acts “as a member of a unit, to emerge from his original narrowness of action and feeling and conceive of himself from the standpoint of the welfare of the group to which he belongs” ([17], pp. 3–4).

The sociological aspect of education is interested in the clarification of values and meaning from the collective standpoint. These values and meaning provide a framework by which the individual understands his or her place in the community. Individuals acquire knowledge about positive and negative social behaviors through the sociological aspect of formal education. This knowledge helps the individual use his or her internal competencies for meaningful development in his or her community.

Accordingly, Dewey thinks that education must move from the psychological component to the sociological component. He states, “…the psychological is the basis. The child’s own instinct and powers furnish the material and give the starting point for all education” ([17], p. 4). He calls on all educators to understand the internal competencies of the learner, without which formal education will be “reduced to a pressure from without” ([17], p. 4). At best, such a system of education will be “haphazard and arbitrary” ([17], p. 4). Worst, it may lead to “friction, or disintegration, or arrest of the child’s nature” ([17], p. 4).

The sociological dimension determines the goal of formal education. The individual’s internal competencies are appropriately classified and empowered within the social context. The social reflection on these internal competencies provides direction to the individual. While the social context indicates the place of individuals in the shared educational experience, it also propels them to participate in the community’s aspirations. By knowing where the community is heading in the future, individuals are directed to what must be achieved to continue contributing to the legacy of education in the community.

For Dewey, both the psychological and sociological dimensions are “organically related” ([17], p. 5). No attempt should be made to pitch one against the other as in a “compromise” or “superimposition” ([17], p. 5). While the psychological component assists the individual to come to terms with his or her internal competencies, the sociological dimension points the individual towards society’s aspirations. Awareness of societal advancement prepares the individual to contribute towards society’s progress.

3.2 The school

Dewey sees the school as a “social institution” that continues the education started by society ([17], p. 7). The school environment must ensure that the learner is a participant in the legacy of knowledge. It must seek to help the learner contribute to the ongoing experience of knowledge. Dewey believes education must focus on preparation for life instead of being preoccupied with the future ([17], p. 6).

Society introduces the learning experience to the learner through social interactions at home, neighborhood, and playground. However, these experiences are vast, and their complexities are likely to disorient the learner: “Existing life is so complex that the child cannot be brought into contact with it without either confusion or distraction; he is either overwhelmed by multiplicity of activities which are going on, so that he loses his own power of orderly reaction…” ([17], p. 7).

Being part of the larger community, the school must be an extension of the educational experiences. It must simplify the details of these experiences so the learner can quickly grasp them. The school must present the realities of life in an organized manner in ways that are meaningful to the learner. The aim is to make the learner understand societal values, activities, and observations and identify their place in it. The focus must be on social life—the school must be a continuation of social interactions and assist the learner to develop soft skills in his or her social relations. In particular, the learner must be assisted to develop self-control. The learner will master appropriate ways to respond to complex conditions embedded in social interactions in the larger society through self-regulation. Teachers must encourage the learner to select good influences and responses from these social relations. Teachers can do this through their “larger experience” and “riper wisdom” ([17], p. 9).

Similarly, school discipline must replicate the elements of discipline in society. Once the learner understands the importance of these disciplinary elements, they would integrate them into their social lives. They would become law-abiding citizens. This is why school assessment must test the learner’s consciousness of social relatedness, adaptation, and adjustments needed to be significant members of society ([17], p. 9).

3.3 Subject-matter/curriculum

Dewey believes that the social life of the learner should be the basis of the curriculum ([17], p. 10). The curriculum organizes the unconscious experience of social life so learners can have self-direction. Accordingly, any subject of study unrelated to the learner’s social life must be rejected ([17], p. 10). For example, the study of nature concerning diversity in space, time, physical objects, living organisms, and geography will not benefit the learner if they do not help them understand social life. In the same vein, literature serves the learner’s interests better when it is made the interpreter of the learner’s social life. Dewey states that these important contents of science and humanities ought to “follow upon and not precede” social experience ([17], p. 10).

Further, disassociating history from the learner’s social life places it in “the distant past,” making it “dead and inert” ([17], p. 11). The learner gains more from the study of history when it is presented as a record of the development of social life. Similarly, it is expected that the curriculum will connect language to the social life of the learner. As a “social instrument,” language is the channel by which the learner shares thoughts in his or her social relations ([17], p. 12). When it is detached from the social experience of the learner, “language loses its social motive, and end” ([17], p. 12).

Engaging learners in “social activities” connects the subjects to the social experience ([17], p. 10). Through these activities, the learner becomes aware of the ongoing social heritage and values of his or her community. Social activities in the curriculum build on what the learner has already been introduced: cocking, sewing, and manual training. They give a social element to the educational process and are foundational to developing essential skills that make learners participate in social life.

To this end, Dewey rejects the practice of subject/course successions ([17], p. 12). Subject/courses succession is reserving some courses for more advanced stages in the learning process. Instead, he advocates for the early inclusion of all the components of social life to the learner. He claims, “if education is life, all life has, from the onset, a scientific aspect, an aspect of art, and culture, and an aspect of communication” ([17], p. 12).

The curriculum cannot serve its real purpose with course/subject succession. Instead, Dewey believes the curriculum should be “a continuing reconstruction of experience” ([17], p. 13). This reconstruction would measure the learner’s development of the “attitudes” and “interest” in his or her social experience ([17], p. 13).

3.4 Method

For Dewey, method refers to the orderly development of learners’ responses to social experiences. The learner manifests progressive control of his or her social experience through personal competencies and interests. For this reason, the right approach to education is a focus on activity. This is because “conscious impression” emerges from “expression” ([17], p. 13). When the learner is introduced to activities, he or she forms ideas “intellectual and rational processes” that assist him or her towards a “better control of action” ([17], p. 14). Activities induce reasoning and basis for reasoning and judgment that the learner uses to bring order into his or her social experience: “reason is primarily the law of order and effective action” ([17], p. 14). Without activities, the educational process makes the learner passive. Such passivity produces “a mass of meaningless and arbitrary ideas” ([17], p. 14).

Again, the right approach to education must put personal images into proper focus. Images are valued when the learner forms/creates them from their engagement with reality. Accordingly, the right approach to education is to equip learners to create personal images of their social experiences.

Further, authentic education will make learners’ interests in the educational process a priority. Interests are foundational to learners’ progressive responses to reality—they are the window into the learner’s store of competencies. Focusing on these interests predicts the direction of the learner in the educational process. It virtually makes the learner lead the way to self-development. When interests are prioritized, it produces an “intellectual curiosity and alertness” that predicts the learner’s development ([17], p. 15).

Moreover, the correct approach to education will create an environment in which emotions follow from actions. Dewey believes sentiments are the automatic results from action and that by establishing or generating habits of beneficial social action, the learner will automatically generate good emotions. Reversing the relation between actions and emotions is to introduce sentimentalism into the educational process. According to Dewey, sentimentalism is worse than the combined effect of “deadness and dullness, formalism, and routine” of failed education ([17], p. 16).

3.5 School and social progress

Dewey sees education as the proper means to “social progress and reform” ([17], p. 16). Authentic education imbibes the orderly evaluation of societal values, leading to reconstructing and applying these values for societal advancement. There are two dimensions to this end—individualistic and socialistic. While the individualistic factor focuses on personal character development for “right living,” the socialistic component aims at the “right character” in the context of community life ([17], p. 16). These two dimensions combine to make ethical living the ultimate end of the educational process. When the school furthers the attainment of moral duties of the community, the larger society is equipped to regulate and “formulate its own purposes…organize its own means and resources, and thus shape itself with definiteness and economy in the direction in which it wishes to move” ([17], p. 17).

It should be the aim of the larger society to provide resources for authentic education as it will inure societal development. Schools should use the “human experience” as a focal point to organize the arts and sciences ([17], p. 17). The proper relationship between the arts and the sciences will assist learners in regulating their prowess and make them understand reality and the conscious “organization of individuals” in society ([17], p. 18). The combination of arts and science will result in “the most commanding motive for human action…the most genuine springs of human conduct aroused, and the best service that human nature is capable of” (X). To this end, the teacher’s duty is the “formation of the proper social life” ([17], p. 18). The larger society must motivate teachers to target “the maintenance of social order and the securing of the right social growth” ([17], p. 18).

4. Discussions

Dewey thinks it is impossible to “foretell definitely just what civilization will be twenty years from now” ([17], p. 6). He argues that education cannot train individuals for “any precise set of conditions” in the future ([17], p. 6). Such impossibility in predicting the future of society could have been valid during Dewey’s era. At the turn of the 19th century, political and socioeconomic realities set in motion several uncertainties. The inability of science to fulfill its promise to society paved the way for the “law of chance” ([18], p. 116).

Socioeconomic conditions are different in the 21st-century. A knowledge-based information economy requires society to work towards the mastery of controlling and understanding the elements of nature to enhance human life. Education today has translated this quest into STEM education. These STEM elements have been structured into socioeconomic goals—Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Hence, society can predict its direction in the future.

Dewey might be limited in knowing the future direction of society, but his ideas on education as preparation for life is as accurate today as when he wrote these words: “to prepare him for the future life means to give him command of himself; it means to train him that he will have the full and ready use of all his capacities; that his eye and ear and hand may be tools ready to command, that his judgment may be capable of grasping the conditions under which it has to work, and the executive forces be trained to act economically and efficiently” ([17], p. 6). Proper education will prepare all learner’s senses to contribute to the present and future advancement of his or her society.

While the call to make education respond to current conditions is critical, a complete disassociation from future realities may not be helpful to both the learner and the larger society. The legacy of experience that forms the core of education has past, present, and future dimensions. Society aspires to advance towards determined goals. These goals must be incorporated into education to equip learners with the skills and courage to respond to systemic changes of both the present and future life. Education must indeed prepare learners for life, but it is also true that societal life includes aspirations towards comprehensive advancement.

Dewey’s experimental/progressive educational ideas have been criticized for insufficient foundational knowledge and academic skills. Theory supports practice/experience and to emphasize the latter to the utter neglect of the former creates a gap in the process of education ([19], p. 287). Prior interactions with reality have produced detailed literature that establishes a context for the learner ([19], p. 132). This literary context provides a framework that underscores the source, context, and aim of the subject matter and the entire educational process. Nathalie Bulk correctly stated that “cognitive development must depend on reflection and social interaction from concrete problematic situations” ([20], p. 603).

Theories give directives on what has been done and what needs improvement in a given discipline. Ignoring these established theoretical concepts implies isolating experience/practice from those theories that birth and direct them. Unfortunately, Dewey’s experimentalism is built on a “functional separation, in the understanding of meaning between observed or experienced phenomenon and theoretical constructs” ([20], p. 575).

Dewey has also been accused of creating an educational process that undermines school authority and organization ([21], pp. 29–30). Experience has varied contents, and it needs to be organized appropriately to be relevant to the learner’s context. This implies a sort of order in the school setting. The relevance of order to the overall educational process attests to the teacher’s role in the school. Teachers’ personalities, attitudes, and didactics cannot be detached from the learning process. They unconsciously influence the content of the exchanges in the teaching and learning process. To some extent, teacher factors make learners’ experiences actionable.

Undermining teachers’ authority in the school through an incautious focus on the learner’s experience is likely to introduce a level of anarchy into the school. Accordingly, Henry T. Edmondson III has blamed Dewey’s educational reforms for causing teacher frustrations and general disinterestedness in education in contemporary American society ([22], p. xiv). A weaker teacher’s role in the learning process would introduce some disorganization into the educational process. Eventually, this disorganization may endanger classroom management and the quest for relevance in the learner’s experience. For Diane Ravitch, Dewey’s experimentalism has made education anti-intellectual, “restricting learners’ access to established records of human civilizations” ([23], p. 285).

With Dewey’s idea of coordination between the school and the society, learners can extend such anarchy to the community. Educated individuals would undermine constituted authority by following their desire for self-preservation at the expense of social integration, cohesion, and inclusiveness ([19], p. 156). Any school that produces self-centered learners can plunge the larger society into a state of chaos.

Dewey is against the subordination or compromise of one dimension of education to the other. He argues that “if we eliminate the social factor from the child, we are left only with an abstraction; if we eliminate the individual factor from society, we are left only with an inert and lifeless mass” ([17], p. 6). Nevertheless, Dewey recommends an interpretation of the “child’s capacities, interests, and habits” ([17], p. 6). One wonders how this interpretation could be made without “pressure from without” ([17], p. 4). Whose frame of reference must be used in this interpretation: society or the individual? Dewey does not address this confusing interface of the two dimensions of education in his theory. His reliance on the teacher to “select influences which shall affect the child and to assist him in properly responding to these influences” is confusing ([17], p. 9). While he forbids any imposition in the educational process, he leaves this vital task to the teacher’s “larger experience” and “riper wisdom” ([17], p. 9). Chances are that the teacher’s inclination to specific elements in social relationships would influence learning contents. Dewey’s concept of authentic education breaks down when learners cannot connect with teacher-determined content. Nevertheless, experienced teachers ought to determine the contents of these influences based on what works in the larger society.

Though Dewey attempts to establish a strong connection between the psychological and sociological dimensions of education, much of his discourse leans towards psychological rather than sociological aspects. He claims that the learner’s social context must be the key reference point for authentic education. Dewey emphasized, “experience, leaving little room for mind ideas and institutions which are at the heart of the learning process” ([24], p. 13). Dewey personalizes the educational process leaving it to the desire of each learner. Little room is given to the community in the educational process. The community only gains through learners’ positive contributions to the ongoing human experience. One wonders how such an educational system can ultimately work out the collective social interest ([19], p. 238).

The community’s disengagement from the educational process creates a vacuum that could be explored to reject societal values. I. B. Berkson notes that Dewey’s focus on social experience is borne out of “naturalism, behaviorism, and individualism…slights moral values, since…historical traditions and communal living” produces societal values ([24], p. 13). In order to meet the exigencies of contemporary society, authentic education must balance the connection between the school and its social context in ways that are relevant to the learner’s social experience.

Dewey’s rejection of the practice of course/subject succession is laudable. It fits nicely into his notion that education prepares learners for life in its entirety ([17], p. 12). Learners who get an early introduction to all aspects of the educational process will likely develop and master various competencies that help them understand and control their experiences for personal and collective benefits. Succession should, however, occur in the contents of the subject. Advanced concepts in these subjects must be reserved for advanced stages in the educational process since grasping such concepts require some depth of comprehension. Otherwise, the educational process will introduce the same complexities embedded in the unconscious social experience of the learner, leading to the learner’s disorientation and lack of focus.

Dewey’s educational reform might have envisaged human advancement and emerging existential issues in a knowledge-based information society. He expected that the school could only be relevant to the ongoing human experience when constructed as a “miniature of society itself” ([25], pp. 506–507). However, his obsession with the overt experiences of learners limits the comprehensive role of theory and the operations of established social institutions in the educational process. Instead of setting the community as a beneficiary of authentic education, he could have equally detailed extensive role of the social context in the learning process. An application of Dewey’s pragmatic theory of education in Sub-Saharan Africa must combine the values of the African social context with higher education to assist learners in understanding their social experiences.

5. Implications and conclusion

Higher education searches for an African identity in most Sub-Saharan African countries ([14], pp. 39–40). Few higher education institutions in this region have added on the production of skilled labor for existing burgeoning industries in the society. While these expectations of higher education in Sub-Saharan Africa are essential, it is necessary to reconstruct the task of education to attend to the complex realities of the 21st-century lifestyle. Achille Joseph Mbembe [26] has quizzed, “is today’s Beast the same as yesterday’s or are we confronting an entirely different apparatus, or entirely different rationality—both of which require us to produce radically new concepts?”

Higher education must prepare the Sub-Saharan African learner for life in the 21st-century and beyond. It must equip learners to resolve systemic challenges such as poverty, healthcare crisis, leadership crisis, engineering, and national and human resource management. Contemporary realities present comprehensive challenges to human life. These challenges may be scientific, technical, engineering, or sociological. For example, the emergence of recent viruses calls attention to the need to survive in the phase of global pandemics. Also, technological advancement from 4th Generation (4G) to 5th Generation (5G) broadband cellular technology must be a concern for the economies of the Sub-Saharan African region. Failure to connect these concerns to higher education in Sub-Saharan Africa would continue to reverse the gains in this region. It should be the task of higher education to produce learners with ready and advanced competencies to respond to these complex realities of the 21st-century. Authentic higher education in Sub-Saharan Africa will be based on the past, but it will equip learners with the attitude to live in the present and survive the unknown but anticipated future.

The curriculum of higher education in Sub-Saharan Africa leans towards theory than praxis. While the theories are expected to positively impact learners’ behavior and thinking, they are cast in socioeconomic demographics unrelated to their social context. Accordingly, these theories bear little relevance to the social experiences of learners in this region. At best, learners are required to memorize these theories and reproduce them during assessments. At worst, learners lack a deep understanding of reality and the competencies to apply these concepts in their social contexts.

A pragmatic approach to higher education in the Sub-Saharan African region would incorporate a balance between theory and praxis. This approach would assist learners in building their careers and engage them in critical thinking. Theory-informed practices would activate learners’ competencies, making them significant participants in the learning process. The basis for learners’ assessment will be the engaged social activities. This approach to higher learning will require learners to analyze, synthesize, and apply innovative concepts for productive ends in their social contexts. Ultimately, learners will acquire the ability to examine real-life issues from multiple perspectives, choosing solutions that advance individual and collective interests and goals.

Ensuring a balance between theory and praxis in higher education in the Sub-Saharan African region requires a change in higher education. Current instructional designs in higher education in the region dominantly center around the lecturer. In this pedagogical approach, the lecturer selects the learning contents and determines the study design and the goal of the learning process. All learners are required to assimilate these contents, memorize them, and reproduce them during evaluation for grading. In some dotted instances, lecturers use the content-focused learning approach. Core subjects are emphasized in the learning process because they contain essential educational information, and the learner’s mastery of their contents will assist them in attaining the goal of higher education.

The latest development in higher education in the Sub-Saharan African region is learner-focused learning—andragogy. Andragogy refocuses decision-making in the learning process from the lecturer to the learner. Learners’ social experiences influence the contents, design, and goal of the educational process. While andragogy provides a collaborative approach to higher learning, unconscious and unorganized social experience may overwhelm the learner, leading to disorientation.

A pragmatic theory of learning emphasizes heutagogy within the broader andragogic approach. Heutagogy is self-determined learning with a strong focus on the learner’s independence, competencies, and attitude ([27], p. 56). Heutagogy invests learners with lifelong learning skills that prepare them to productively navigate through the complexities of their social experiences ([28], p. 381). The lecturer serves as an academic coach, who may be called upon per the learner’s needs. Learners discover the content, design, and goal of the higher educational process ([27], p. 56).

The heutagogical approach requires learners to determine problem areas in the subject and explore their social contexts for solutions ([29], p. 135). This approach transforms learners from a state of positivity to activity, with higher-order thinking and attitude that will make them useful in their social contexts ([30], p. 129). Some educationists have identified competency-based curriculum (CBC) as a model within heutagogy. Charles Ong’ondo described the CBC model as “outcomes-based rather than content-based. It is certification-based on demonstrated learning outcomes. The focus is not on knowledge for knowledge’s sake, but on how that knowledge can be applied” (cited in [31], n.p.).

The gulf between higher education institutions and the larger social context in the Sub-Saharan African region must be closed to adopt the heutagogical learning strategy. The unrelatedness of higher education to the larger social context continues to affect authentic higher education in the region adversely. Higher education institutions and the larger society have varying views on the task, contents, goals, and design of higher education and the problems, goals, and developmental strategies of the larger society.

A pragmatic theory of education will provide the avenue for connecting society’s goals, problems, and strategies to the task, contents, goals, and design of higher education in the Sub-Saharan African region. In this collaborative paradigm, higher education institutions and industries will develop academic content and determine the employable skills and attitudes learners must possess to fit into the corporate society. The industry-academia collaboration will also point to a store of critical, innovative ideas and models for the burgeoning industries in the Sub-Saharan African region. Market-driven learning designs, work-based internships, tracer studies, and grants for priority academic/industrial fields will facilitate the inclusion of business-like decisions and strategies into the contents of the higher educational process ([32], p. 63).

A quality higher education in the Sub-Saharan African region cannot be achieved solely by the efforts of higher education institutions. Governments of the larger society have essential roles to play in reconstructing higher education to meet the exigencies of the knowledge-based information economy. Governments in the region must implement the various policies and strategies they have designed on higher education. These policies must empower lecturers and administrators of the higher education institution to work towards authentic higher education. Policies on higher education must target raising the standard of quality faculty through lifelong learning opportunities such as sandwich, online, and distance learning programs. Governments must ensure that faculty work in attractive and invigorating higher education environments. Especially, faculty must have access to fast broadband internet connectivity and open learning resources.

Further, governments must enforce regulatory efforts and accreditation requirements on entry, contents, delivery, staffing, exit, and management of higher education through their agencies. The establishment and maintenance of quality assurance mechanisms across higher education institutions will significantly boost higher education in the Sub-Saharan African region.

A knowledge-based information economy requires learners with higher-order thinking and attitude. The Sub-Saharan African region has been longing for high stock of individuals with these attitudes and abilities. It expects higher education to produce a stock of human resources with the ability to analyze, synthesize, and apply innovative concepts in their social context to advance society’s goals and strategies towards development. However, higher education in the Sub-Saharan Africa region falls short of this target. A reconstruction of higher education in the region along the lines of pragmatic educational philosophy would be promising. In My Pedagogic Creed, Dewey’s pragmatic views offer a paradigm for reforming higher education in the Sub-Saharan African region. Its strong emphasis on social activities within the social experience of the learner must be balanced with the values of the learner’s larger social context and empirical theories to create authentic higher education that produces a labor force to move the larger society towards its developmental goals and strategies.