The Importance Of Education In Kaffir Boy By Mark Mathabane

During Mark Mathabane’s autobiography Kaffir Boy, Mathabane comes to the conclusion of the importance and impact education can have on his life. When living in South Africa during the time of apartheid, Mathabane and his family struggle to survive day after day; blacks simply were not making enough money to live the life human beings are meant to live. His mother has to work long strenuous days just to gather enough money to be able to send Johanne to school. Through the education he receives, Johannes can finally find the escape from reality he has so longed for. Nothing in Johannes’s life would have been possible if it were not for the education. After a long year full of toil, Johannes finds himself at the top of his class and the ceremony …show more content…
Johannes is not a person who woke up everyday and trek the many miles it took to get to school joyfully. School was a constant struggle for him between the constant beatings he received there from the teachers and the harassment he received at home from his father. Students all across America and even from many other countries complain about school they had to go to, but we do not put things in perspective. Students here in America do not have to endure all that Johannes has to do. Johannes has to wake up earlier than most kids who go to school, endure countless beatings for such insignificant things, put up with overwhelming amounts of work, all while he is not sufficiently fed. Sure the Hebelungu food program came and would feed the kids for 5 cents a day, but Johannes sometimes could not muster the coins he would need to pay for food, and on those days Johannes would go long periods of time without any source of nutrition. Schools in America consist of relatively small organized classes. Johanne and his fellow peers are herded into the small school house like cattle, all squishing together since there were too many bodies for the small classroom. For the most part, teachers in America are very capable of doing their job and do it well. Johannes was taught by a sixteen year old woman who had to leave halfway through the year because she has a mental breakdown. Not to mention, kids in America are required by law to go to school, it is not a choice. These kids in South Africa who are dealing with the cruel reign of apartheid only have the privilege to go to school, most of whom cannot utilize this privilege. Many kids become involved in gangs or can no longer pay the school tuition required to attend. Students in America take the lives they live for granted, and while reading about Johannes’s tale of rising to the top of his class one cannot help but