Foreign education models are reportedly failing Pacific children, leading to calls for a fundamental shift in approach.

While speaking at the Education Act review in Nasinu yesterday, Fiji National University Communications Consultant Christal Kapoor states that systems imported from Australia and New Zealand are unsuitable for Fiji.

She stresses the need to include iTaukei and Indo-Fijian identity in the school curriculum.

Kapoor calls for the return of traditional folk songs, storytelling, and everyday use of local languages in the classroom.

She believes Fiji should develop its own curriculum tailored to local needs rather than adopting a one-size-fits-all approach.

Kapoor says while education is important, it cannot come at the cost of identity.

“What about our people living? What about our folk songs? What about my culture? I don’t want to lose it. In case you didn’t know again the surprise is the question about where you are. The Hindi that is taught in the schools to us is not our language. Fiji Hindi in itself is a different language. Where’s the application of that language?”

Kapoor believes the curriculum review is a chance to build an education system that is home-grown, relevant and empowering.

Reflecting on Girmit Remembrance Day, Kapoor says it was a powerful reminder of the need to preserve cultural identity.

She used the commemoration as an example to show how the stories of ordinary people and ancestral struggles are only acknowledged briefly often just once a year and left out of daily learning.

“I hate being celebrated only when May come and we recognize our ancestors greatness. I have been a part of this country for as long as I can remember. My grandparents have been a part of this country for hundreds of years. But in the school curriculum we are only there in Social Science in a little paragraph and after that when it becomes very clear that everyone can be recognized.”

Kapoor adds if students do not hear or see their culture represented in everyday lessons, they may grow up thinking it is not important.

She is calling on Education Ministry to move beyond symbolic gestures and take concrete steps to decolonize the classroom by developing a curriculum that is home-grown, relevant and empowering.

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