** Please visit our website: http://www.africanassociation.org **

 Good kids are not born they are made.This may sound paradoxical but nothing could be closer to the truth. Schooling begins at home. It is for this reason that we, Africans, have time-honored rites of passage, namely,the initiation school, the rites of virginity, pre-marital rites and more. These rites are intended to inculcate into our offspring strong moral values--courage, honesty, probity,good neighborliness, stewardship,stoicism, altruism and so on. All credible educators know that the home is the cradle of every child's learning process.

 How sad then that a great many of us in the Diaspora have abdicated the noble task of grooming our kids culturally speaking.Sound cultural education does not occur by chance.Mastery of our indigenous languages and cultures is an imperative. He who does not know from where he comes knows not where he is going.Our cultural identity is too precious to trade for borrowed robes!

 Parents owe it as a duty to assist their kids acquire survival skills via western education. However, it would be suicidal to do so at the expensive of our cultural heritage. To parody a famous American statesman, J.F.Kennedy: Ask not what your children can do for you, ask what you can do for your chidren.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------
To unsubscribe/subscribe or view archives of postings, visit:

        http://maelstrom.stjohns.edu/archives/aam.html

AAM Website:  http://www.africanassociation.org
----------------------------------------------------------------------------