Why British boarding schools are so eager to open in Nigeria

For a few years, well-off Nigerians have despatched their youngsters to prestigious British boarding faculties – however now a few of these establishments are organising campuses in Africa’s most populous nation.

Final yr, Charterhouse launched a main college within the metropolis of Lagos and can open a secondary college this September.

Rugby Faculty may also start providing secondary training in September. Different well-known establishments, resembling Millfield, Wellington School and Harrow, are additionally exploring alternatives in Nigeria.

This clearly all comes with a price ticket for Nigerian mother and father – however the nation’s well-heeled elite have traditionally despatched their youngsters to the UK for secondary training, drawn to the British curriculum’s rigour, status and world alternatives.

“I am really enthusiastic about it,” says Karima Oyede, a British-Nigerian administration advisor, whose son is at the moment in yr 10 at Rugby within the UK however can be shifting to its Lagos college in September.

Her household has been which means to relocate to Nigeria for some time however has not achieved so earlier due to the youngsters’s training.

“Having the chance to expertise the British system in his nation of origin is the very best of each worlds,” she says.

Nigeria already has a proliferation of personal faculties however high-quality, internationally recognised training throughout the nation will enchantment to many mother and father, notably those that want to protect their youngsters’s cultural id.

“African mother and father love the truth that they’re giving their youngsters worldwide standing to allow them to compete with their counterparts in another a part of the world, however they do not need their youngsters to lose their African-ness,” says Ijay Uwakwe-Okoronkwo, the founding father of Nkuzhi Studying Basis in Nigeria’s capital, Abuja.

The academic advisor, who advises mother and father and faculties on worldwide boarding choices, explains the extra relaxed, much less respectful perspective youngsters return with after going to highschool overseas isn’t at all times appreciated.

This cultural dilemma extends to the rising dialog round LGBTQ points. Identical-sex relationships and public shows of affection are unlawful in Nigeria and homosexuality isn’t overtly mentioned or promoted.

It’s one thing that the brand new crop of British faculties has taken on board. For instance, whereas Charterhouse UK shows a rainbow flag, the Nigeria college doesn’t.

“We’re a British unbiased college however sitting firmly inside Nigerian cultural wants,” says John Todd, head of Charterhouse Nigeria.

“There’s this large concern about Western cultural views.

“For fogeys right here, we all know it is a actually large subject. It is a cause mother and father are anxious in regards to the UK faculties.

“I am not making a judgement – it is simply the best way it’s.”

British establishments in Nigeria don’t have any alternative however to “comply with the regulation of the land”, he acknowledges, including: “We’re 100% compliant.”

Recognising Nigeria’s deeply spiritual society, Charterhouse additionally permits mother and father to take their youngsters dwelling from the boarding home for Sunday church companies, with the expectation that they return by Monday morning.

There are a number of causes behind the rising curiosity of prestigious British faculties in opening campuses in Nigeria.

Whereas areas just like the Center East and China are already saturated with worldwide faculties, Africa is comparatively virgin territory.

“Nigeria is the gateway to Africa, and Africa is form of the final continent for British faculties to ascertain in,” says Mark Brooks, an export champion for the UK’s Division for Enterprise and Commerce.

He organises annual occasions in Nigeria the place about 20 British faculties meet potential college students and fogeys.

“Nigeria has an unbelievable repute for producing pushed, high-achieving college students,” says Mr Brooks.

“There isn’t a college I work with that hasn’t lately had a Nigerian scholar function head boy or deputy head boy. A scholar could be a part of the sixth type and find yourself being the top boy inside a yr.

“I’ve introduced a whole lot of head academics to Nigeria through the years, and the phrase is out within the UK that we have to take Nigeria severely.”

Timing has additionally proved key, as the price of sending youngsters to the UK has soared. Simply three years in the past, the alternate fee of the native foreign money was 500 naira to £1; now it stands at 2,200 naira.

On prime of that, the Labour authorities within the UK lately imposed 20% VAT on personal college charges.

Past tuition, households face further bills like flights for each college students and visiting mother and father.

Establishing these faculties in Nigeria permits households to take care of the identical normal of training whereas considerably lowering the monetary pressure.

The annual charges at Charterhouse UK, for instance, are round £60,000 ($78,000), whereas the charges at its Lagos campus are equal to roughly £15,000.

“Our primary classroom academics are expatriates, however 90% of the workers are native,” says Mr Todd.

By using native folks in roles resembling assistant academics, administration, finance, human assets, advertising and marketing, amenities, safety, gardeners, drivers, PAs and secretaries, the college can considerably scale back prices in comparison with the UK, the place labour is way more costly.

An enormous training hole already exists in Nigeria, with many mother and father choosing personal training of various high quality. Many battle to pay the upper charges quite than sending their youngsters to authorities faculties, which are sometimes free however tormented by poorly educated academics and frequent strikes.

Because of this, the arrival of British faculties could not drastically change Nigeria’s training system.

Nonetheless, they may pose a menace to established elite faculties just like the British Worldwide Faculty in Lagos and The Regent Faculty in Abuja, which opened within the early 2000s.

Such faculties have lengthy been prime selections for these in a position to pay the annual tuition charges that always attain tens of hundreds of {dollars}.

“Rugby Faculty Nigeria is coming additionally to assist, develop and be taught from the faculties at the moment in Nigeria,” says Mr Brooks, who’s in control of the college’s advertising and marketing.

“We’re coming to assist with partnerships as properly, instructor coaching, and a complete vary of initiatives.”

Mr Todd believes the Nigerian market is massive sufficient to accommodate all the brand new faculties with out threatening present ones. About 40% of the 200 million inhabitants is below 14.

He expects the best affect to be felt within the UK.

Whereas Charterhouse UK sometimes has an extended ready listing and shouldn’t be affected, much less sought-after boarding faculties could expertise a decline in enrolment owing to the brand new competitors in Nigeria.

“Curiosity in our secondary college could be very sturdy,” says Mr Todd. “We have already got Nigerian mother and father within the UK sending their youngsters to the Charterhouse in Nigeria for September.”

In reality, reaching out to Nigerians within the UK has been one among their key advertising and marketing methods.

“You get this premier model at a lower cost, and each Nigerian has an aunt or uncle in Lagos” who is usually a guardian, he provides.

It may very well be that this development extends to British universities. Nigeria’s tertiary training system faces even higher challenges than its secondary sector, with many college students opting to check overseas.

In 2023, Nigeria ranked among the many prime 10 nations for UK scholar visas, in response to UK authorities information.

However with overseas alternate difficulties and stricter visa laws, finding out overseas is changing into more and more difficult – and universities that depend on greater worldwide tuition charges seem like struggling.

Earlier this month, British MP Helen Hayes, chair of the parliamentary Training Committee, acknowledged the UK’s greater training sector was in hassle.

“Dozens of universities are making redundancies and cuts to programs, making an attempt to remain afloat amid uncertainty over the place their cash is coming from,” she said when announcing a session to consider the sector’s future.

If sufficient Nigerian college students can not go to the UK to check, British universities could discover it worthwhile to come back to them, as they’ve elsewhere on the planet.

In reality, Nigeria’s premier college, the College of Ibadan, was established in 1948 as a campus of the College of London, with levels awarded carrying the identical worth and status.

Ms Uwakwe-Okoronkwo believes many Nigerian mother and father would admire this chance, as it could enable their youngsters to remain in Nigeria lengthy sufficient to mature earlier than probably shifting overseas, in the event that they select to take action.

“Many mother and father are anxious about sending their youngsters out of the nest too early,” she says.

For Ms Oyede, whose daughter may also be beginning at Rugby Faculty in Lagos come September, the timing of all this might not be higher.

She says the British college opening has already been an “incentive to return dwelling”.

The prospect of college alternatives could be a welcome bonus.

Adaobi Tricia Nwaubani is a contract Nigerian journalist and novelist primarily based in Abuja and London.

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