Who Are Missionaries and Their Comments About
the Value of MK Teachers and Schools.
"MK Education: From a Parent's Perspective
"The saying goes, "Ever changing Africa. Never changing Africa." Perhaps this expression can be applied to MK education, too. Some of the issues of MK education change. Others may never. It is the issues that do not change which, I think, place MK education in a category all its own. It is these issues that concern missionary parents and it is these issues that MK education seeks to address. Perhaps describing our own situation as a missionary family can help elucidate these issues.
"We arrived on the African continent when our three children were ages 8, 6, and 4 years old. Having homeschooled the older two children in the States prior to our arrival on the mission field, we assumed that we would continue to homeschool. Though we knew in some sense that living in another country would be different, we really did not understand the amount of time it took to simply "live," and live in a healthy manner. What we found was that day to day living was taking away from time that needed to be devoted to homeschooling. Other factors also came to bear upon the homeschooling. Reluctantly, we began looking at the local schools in the city. However, none seemed to fit our children for a variety of reasons, the most important one being the lack of a Christian worldview in the education as a whole. We had come to Africa to help train men and women to think biblically, how could we then send our children to a school that did not seek to train them to think biblically? "Another missionary knowing of our situation offered to take us to visit a boarding school for missionary children run by a mission other than our own. Sending young children off to boarding school was not an idea we ever considered, but now we were faced with the idea to explore. Our children wanted to visit the school, so together as a family we visited the school.
"As hard as it was, we as a family prayerfully decided to send the two oldest children to attend the boarding school. That difficult decision was not well supported by all of our sending churches, sadly.
"Unfortunately because many in the States have no idea what missionary families face when it comes to schooling their children, assumptions are made that decisions concerning education can be made with the same criteria as in the States. It has been said by well meaning adults that if their children cannot be educated either at home or in a near by school, they would leave the mission field or never go in the first place. But this easy answer makes the decision to follow Jesus into mission work easily negated by circumstances. This easy answer also does not take anything outside of an American setting into consideration.
"So what are some of the issues that missionary parents from all over the world face that have not changed over the years? There are concerns that their children know they are loved by them and by God; quality of education; separation for extended periods if their children are in boarding schools; uncertainty and perhaps instability in some foreign countries (exacerbated, again, if children are at boarding schools)i issues of identity and acculturation; language issues; and preparedness of their children to survive as adults in the home country of their parents after growing up in a different country, just to name a few. These issues vary from those parents/children face who never leave their home country. Yet these very issues will be factors influencing the education of MKs. "The encouraging news is that there are educators who have given their lives to follow Jesus onto the mission field to minister to a very special group. What is this group that in past decades may have been overlooked, a group that had to keep a stiff upper lip, a group that has themselves made a big impact on the mission field as they have followed their own parents in following Jesus beyond their home, a group from which even some of these current educators come? Missionary Kids! Our experience has been that overall this group of educator missionaries has a special calling and their obedience to their calling has brought blessing and help to missionaries like us who labor in other ways.
"How are teachers of MKs a blessing and a help to missionary parents? In our experience we have seen teachers who are devoted to the task of showing the love of Jesus to these kids. That doesn't mean everyone is perfect. It does mean that overall these teachers have been trying to build on the foundation of Jesus Christ in the lives of our children. It is an encouragement to us when the children say, "Mom, Dad, you know Mr. said ...." and it was something that we have been saying for years but they hadn't really heard. Or we see our children doing something very positive because "Miss .. said I should do thus and so." Also in our experience, we have seen on home assignment how our kids were right on target academically because they were in an MK school with good academic standards. Generally, we have felt like teachers have tried to work with us, not against us, in our desire to educate our children and to help our children learn to love and serve the very One who brought us onto the mission field. This has made our work at a theological college easier, though we sorely miss our children.
"I will never forget the day during school break that our oldest son told me that he wanted to tell me something. He said, "Mom, I just want to thank you for sending us off to boarding school. I know it has been hard, but I have grown in ways I never would have grown if you had just homeschooled me. Thank you, Mom". To that I say, 'Thank God for MK schools. Amen'."