Out of Africa: Learning from Teaching in the Cradle of Humankind

In 1990, Joseph Ki-Zerbo, the Burkinabe historian, published a book on the school situation in Africa. Ki-Zerbo affirms that “the education system, rather than a driving force, is a time-bomb which, given the population explosion, is exhausting economic resources without yielding an adequate return, breaking down social structures and rendering cultures sterile” [1]—a lucid analysis of the state of the art of one of the critical sectors for the development. After more than 30 years, the leading educational issue in Africa is that although the enrolment rate in higher education has more than doubled in the past decades, the continent has the lowest university enrolment rates globally, as appeared in a recent report titled: “The Right to Higher Education in Africa: Briefing note compendium” released by UNESCO [2].

In the last decade, my wandering from West to Central Africa to East Africa has generated a consciousness of the educational system in the Sub-Sahara area. It starts by asserting that there isn’t a unique Africa but a constellation of various environments and heritage where young generations are desperately eager to learn. Diversities exist along several dimensions: economic, political, institutional, cultural, linguistic and educational. However, differences are seen as an added value instead of an obstacle in the teaching activities, and, in some cases, a lack of appropriate tools allowed to re-invent the methodological criteria. In DR Congo, the tangible heritage of tropical modernism still dominates the debate on the relationship between architecture and the city; in Rwanda, a solid public administration enables strong ties with the University, involving actively students and staff in reshaping the urban development; in Egypt, the current place of work, the previous two aspects converge challenging all stakeholders in finding the proper response in designing towards the next heritage. If it is true that each generation has to build its own “pyramids” [3], the next one shall actively participate before an adequate education.

The analysed Design Studio projects discuss a binary collaboration between the public and private sectors. On one side, the academic interlocutor is consulted to propose solutions to real problems involving students and staff. Conversely, the proponent is asked to provide a rational and sustainable solution for the community. At ISAU in Kinshasa, the students of the 5^th semester were involved in the design of affordable housing for teachers at the ISP (Higher Institute of Pedagogy) in Mbanza-Ngungu, following the request of the local authorities. In Rwanda, the RHA (Rwanda Housing Authority), with the support of GGI (Green Global Growth Institute) and the German Company SWECO Ltd, in synergy with the university, developed dwelling proposals for the Green City Kigali project.

Both case studies are meant to serve as examples of changing strategies for the professionals and the municipalities, most of the time fascinated by foreign ideas instead of revaluing the existing local inputs.

In 2003, Marot proposed three possible approaches to memory in architecture: “architecture as an instrument of memory, memory as a material, or as a dimension of architecture” [4]. The role African cultural traditions can play in Africa’s modern educational development has generally gone unrecognised. This is partly related to the fact that they associate the concept of progress with modernity and simultaneously identify the tradition with what is backward and primitive. With such a perspective, traditional Africa is seen as having little or nothing to do with the present and future developments. “If there is any activity in developing countries which needs to be intimately related to their traditions, it is the activity of education,” says Guy Hunter in 1969 [5]. The memory of memory requires a participatory process involving no longer only foreign scholars but has to be led by locals. The education of the next architects or urban designers can’t neglect the assigned value and meaning of memory, which is essentially based in Africa on oral traditions.

The awareness of the past learned at school is one piece of the puzzle, as it appears evident that educated people can command the skills necessary for sustainable economic growth and a better quality of life. The 4^th SDG (Sustainable Development Goal) Sustainable Development Goal 4 is about quality education: “Ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all”. Opportunities in the case of architectural education have to educate architects conscious of the need for buildings to develop their countries anyway, not to collide with the need for sustainability.

Founded in 1943, the Higher Institute of Architecture only 1963 opened its doors to train national architects. Despite having graduated most of the registered architects in Congo, the school has yet to be able to imprint generations of practitioners decisively, above all because the ongoing curriculum is still based on the original one imported from Europe. European teachers who taught in the 60s–80s did not include the architecture of Kinshasa in their teaching and learning activities. History class teaches the history of other environments rather than the local. All the Congolese students or scholars who wish to study the existing heritage are not even allowed to take specific photos, and the archives on modern architecture are located mainly in Belgium; therefore, they are inaccessible to the people of Kinshasa. The absence, to date, of a course on the architecture of Congo, whether traditional or modern, in the teaching program seems to indicate and confirm the eclectic and extravagant path taken on local architecture [7]. The city of Kinshasa's architectural landscape is not the most pleasant, and many neighbourhoods are ancient, with the metal sheets rusting for decades [8]. Apart from the question of densification, the demographic explosion has mainly corollaries in the problems of mobility and modernisation. This requires transformations, constructions, demolitions or simply adequate planning supported by politics. Buildings that could be described as symbolic, which tell the city’s history and form a physically coherent structure serving as guidelines for future developments, are systematically abandoned or “regenerated”, supposedly modernising them.

In the six years of working at ISAU and several other private and public Institutions scattered throughout the country, one research topic became dominant: Tropical modernism. Mbanza Ngungu, located in the South Province of Congo, was planned and built by the colonial authorities as a touristic destination to escape from the unpleasant climate of the capital. Yves Robert, on the tangible and intangible heritage, reminds the importance of raising, especially in the local population, “the awareness of the heritage value, at the national and even international scale, of the metallic architecture from the end of the XIXth century and the beginning of the XXth century, sometimes adorned with ornamental Art Nouveau elements” in Mbanza Ngungu [9]. In 1972, the ISP project was inaugurated as part of a series of new educational buildings scattered in the remote provinces of Congo. The students of the 5^th semester registered at the Department of Architecture at ISAU were asked to conceive the campus extension—the request from the local authorities to implement the accommodation capacity for staff members. The existing housing typologies are single villas dedicated to the highest rank, twin houses for the professors and row houses for the junior staff, which must be implemented with additional dwellings.

The proposals have considered the tangible and intangible heritage represented by the colonial buildings in Mbanza Ngungu and the ISP construction shaped according to the principles of tropical modernism. Therefore, the immobile longitudinal axis is aligned east-west, thus making the shortest elevations almost blind, and the main ones are protected by brise-soles, overhanging slabs, and perforated walls. Adequately placed and sized openings guarantee natural cross-ventilation. The consciousness of the past and the need to be sustainable were among the primary objectives of Design Studio 5, preparing the students for future challenges (Figs. 1 and 2).

Established in 2013 due to merging existing institutions, the University of Rwanda is the only public Academic Establishment in the country. The College of Science and Technology (CST) in Kigali hosts the School of Architecture and Built Environment (SABE) devoted to educating future architects. A five-year program mainly focused on skilling students on operating in the local environment, pointing to the sustainable goals set by the Government. Rwanda is developing itself according to a polycentric regional structure, with six secondary cities revolving around the capital.

According to the curriculum, SABE's teaching and learning activities must comply with a series of regulations and laws approved by the government. Therefore, Design and Bachelor Thesis Studios primarily target topics related to green urban development and upgrading existing informal settlements.

The Department of Architecture of the University of Rwanda (UR) hosted for two consecutive years the W.A.Ve. Abroad. After the experience of W.A.Ve. Abroad 2018 gathered in Kigali students from the University Iuav of Venice, Uganda Martyrs University and the University of Rwanda; in 2019, the international workshop attracted a new partnership both on the academic side with the Catholic University of Bukavu and the private sector with Sweco Ltd. The aim of designing affordable dwelling units for the Green City Pilot – a project led by Sweco Ltd and located in Gasabo District, accompanied the students along the course’s weeks, which culminated in an exhibition of all realised outputs: three masterplan and three affordable housing types for each of the designed masterplan. A repeatable community model in the different areas of the country concerning both the context seen in its various features and the SDGs (Sustainable Development Goals), with specific care for the eleventh one: Sustainable cities and communities. The town built itself over time and is becoming more and more sustainable in the sense of a continuous comparison with its history and identity toward the future. Therefore, the workshop allowed teachers and students to be involved in a synergistic project between the public and private sectors, with a view to a continuous exchange of know-how and mutual training. Specifically, the students were asked to develop and present ideas and drawings for a founding urban settlement on the southwest side of Murama Hill in Kigali. Murama is a partly informal umudugudu, or “village” or “neighbourhood”, that has developed in recent decades on the northeast side of the same hill. Despite being part of the city territory, its condition is more peri-urban than urban, closer to the conformation of a “village” than an urban “neighbourhood” [10]. Its built fabric looks like a group of amasibo, or “groups of houses”, interspersed with green areas and variously arranged in scattered order on the same side of the hill. The other side, the southwest one, is instead devoid of buildings. Considering the urugo, or “housing unit”, as the essential element of the urban composition on this side of Murama Hill, students were asked to imagine and draw a founding urban settlement capable of directing the design choices towards new city models expandable in other areas of the country (Figs. 3 and 4).