A River Cess school Credit: Eric Opa Doue/New Narratives
Last month, in a basement office in Monrovia, I watched a teacher with 15 years of experience fail a sixth-grade math test. She wasn’t an outlier—she represented the norm in a nation that ranks 155th out of 156 countries according to the 2023 World Bank Human Capital Index. After a decade of traversing Africa’s education landscape, from Ethiopia’s ambitious reforms to Rwanda’s digital revolution, I can confidently state that Liberia isn’t just failing at education. We’re actively manufacturing ignorance.
By Philip Pleiwon, human capital development expert.
The numbers paralyze: 88% of our teachers cannot pass the tests they administer. Our children spend half as much time in school compared to their Ghanaian peers yet learn one-third as much. According to the World Bank, we hemorrhage tens of millions annually in lost productivity—more than our entire education budget. But these statistics, devastating as they are, mask the human catastrophe I’ve witnessed across 300 schools in this nation.
The most dangerous thing in Liberia isn’t poverty—it’s the slow death of our potential.
Picture a surgeon who cannot identify basic anatomy or an engineer who cannot solve simple equations. Now multiply that incompetence across an entire generation. This is the reality we’ve normalized. In classrooms from Red Light to Voinjama, I’ve observed a peculiar form of educational theater: teachers performing the act of teaching; students mimicking the learning posture, and administrators pretending this charade represents education. What makes this crisis unique isn’t its depth—it’s our response to it. Nations like Sierra Leone, emerging from conflicts as devastating as ours, have transformed their education systems within a decade. Meanwhile, we’ve developed an elaborate mythology of excuses, with “poverty” as our favorite hymn of helplessness.
The truth is more damning: we’re not failing because we’re poor. We’re poor because we’ve institutionalized failure.
Every time we celebrate a graduation ceremony where students can’t read their diplomas, every time we promote a teacher who wouldn’t pass their exams, we’re not just lowering standards—we’re normalizing national suicide. This is more than just another development challenge. It’s an existential crisis threatening Liberia’s survival in a world where knowledge economies determine national destiny. The most dangerous thing in Liberia isn’t what we lack—it’s what we’ve learned to accept.
Beyond Access: The Quality Crisis
Last week, I sat in a crowded 11th-grade classroom in central Monrovia—thirty-two students, all present, silent, and seemingly attentive. The physics teacher drew electron configurations on the board, his confidence masking a crucial fact I’d discovered earlier: he couldn’t explain why atoms behave the way they do. His students dutifully copied diagrams they couldn’t comprehend, participating in an elaborate education performance where learning was optional, but attendance was mandatory.
This is not an isolated case—it’s the template. In 300 school visits across Liberia, I’ve witnessed a masterclass in educational theater. At a “top” high school in Buchanan, I asked senior students to solve fundamental algebra problems that their Rwandan counterparts mastered in 8th grade. Only two could complete the task. The principal’s response? “At least they’re in school.” This celebration of mere presence over performance epitomizes our crisis.
Consider these scenes from the past month alone:
- A history teacher in Nimba County teaching World War II with no mention of its causes or implications, reducing one of humanity’s pivotal moments to a list of dates
- A “computer class” where 40 students share three broken laptops, learning Microsoft Word by copying definitions from a chalkboard
- A science laboratory where students have never experimented yet can recite the steps of the scientific method like a prayer.
Meanwhile, just across our borders, transformation flourishes. In Sierra Leonean classrooms, students debate complex ethical issues in critical thinking workshops. Rural Rwandan schools run innovation clubs where teenagers design solutions for community challenges. In Ghana’s public schools, students code on shared tablets, and their aspirations are not limited by circumstance.
But in Liberia, we’ve mastered the art of educational cosplay—perfect uniforms hiding empty notebooks, polished shoes walking paths to nowhere, proud parents photographing graduations where diplomas certify twelve years of sustained presence rather than learning. We’ve created a system in which the appearance of education has become more important than the education itself. This is not about access to education. It’s about access to actual learning. Every filled classroom where critical thinking dies, every passed exam that tests memory instead of understanding, and every graduated student who can’t apply their learning: these aren’t signs of progress. They’re symptoms of a nation that has forgotten the difference between schooling and education.
Dismantling Our Excuses: The Comfortable Lies We Tell Ourselves
“We’re poor,” the chorus echoes through every education ministry meeting, every parent-teacher conference, and every policy discussion. It’s Liberia’s lullaby—the sweet song we sing to ourselves to justify mediocrity. Let’s shatter this comfort zone with simple math and uncomfortable truths.
Burkina Faso shares our GDP per capita almost to the dollar. Their classrooms are no better equipped, and their teachers are no better paid. Yet their students demonstrate twice our literacy rates and three times our numeracy scores. They don’t have secret resources—it’s ruthless standards. When their teachers don’t show up, they’re replaced. When their students don’t learn, someone answers. While we perfect excuses, they perfect execution.
“But we’re recovering from war,” we remind ourselves. So was Rwanda. In 1994, their education system was shattered and weaponized for genocide. Today, their rural science students learn robotics in buildings still bearing bullet holes. Their transformation didn’t start with better buildings or bigger budgets. It began with a national refusal to accept mediocrity as destiny.
Perhaps the most damning comparison comes from our next-door neighbor. Sierra Leone, emerging from a conflict almost as devastating as ours, spends $82 per student annually—practically identical to our $80. The difference? Their $82 buys accountability, standards, and results. Ours buys excuses, delays, and degrees without learning. We get precisely what we demand for our money.
“We lack infrastructure,” we protest. Yet I’ve watched Ugandan village schools produce globally competitive students in structures that would make our excuses blush. Their classes might meet under trees, but their minds soar past our concrete buildings. Singapore, now an education powerhouse, built its foundation in attap huts. They understood what we refuse to acknowledge: excellence starts in minds, not buildings.
Each excuse crumbles against the weight of regional evidence. Nations with resources equal to ours have overcome every limitation we cite. The difference is that they treat their constraints as challenges to solve, while we use them as justifications to fail. The truth we’re avoiding is simple: our poverty of resources is far less damaging than our poverty of expectations. Every time we accept a teacher who can’t teach, every time we pass a student who can’t read, every time we make another excuse for mediocrity, we’re not protecting our limitations—we’re betraying our potential. Our neighbors have proven that transformation doesn’t require wealth. It involves something far more valuable and scarcer in Liberia: the courage to demand excellence even when it seems impossible.
The Root Causes: A System Designed to Fail
We must confront an uncomfortable truth: Our education system isn’t broken—it’s functioning exactly as we designed it. The crisis we face results from systematic choices prioritizing appearance over substance, compliance over competence, and excuses over excellence.
Let’s start with the frontline: our teachers. When only 12% can pass their tests, we’re not facing a skills gap; we’re witnessing intellectual bankruptcy in real-time. The rot goes deeper. Our curriculum reads like a historical document rather than an educational blueprint. We teach computer science without computers, critical thinking without debate, and science without experiments. But the most damaging root cause is our collective psyche. We’ve internalized mediocrity so deeply that excellence feels foreign—almost arrogant. We’re actively teaching the wrong lessons. Each day in our schools, we fail to build capacity and systematically build incapacity. We teach that standards are negotiable, excellence is optional, and showing up is the same as stepping up.
Living with the Crisis: The Daily Cost of Educational Collapse
The manifestation of our educational failure isn’t confined to classrooms—it permeates every aspect of Liberian life. Any foreigner who has spent time in Liberia notices it within minutes: a peculiar lethargy in our national psyche, a cognitive sluggishness that marks nearly every interaction. International trainers across Africa consistently report the same disturbing pattern: Liberian professionals are uniquely challenging to train. After conducting workshops in twelve African nations, one corporate trainer described the stark difference: “In Kenya or Ghana, concepts are grasped quickly and applied immediately. In Liberia, even basic instructions require endless repetition, and still, the execution is painfully slow.”
The impact on daily operations is devastating. Tasks that take hours elsewhere take weeks here. Emails require multiple follow-ups and still need clarification responses. Project timelines stretch endlessly as simple concepts need repeated explanations. Even basic problem-solving—the kind that should be instinctive for any high school graduate—becomes a drawn-out ordeal.
But here’s the crucial point: when that waiter struggles to remember your order, when that young office worker can’t grasp basic instructions, the proper response isn’t frustration—it’s heartbreak. These aren’t personal failures; they’re victims of systemic betrayal. That waiter never had a teacher who could explain the essential cognitive organization. That young professional never learned critical thinking skills because their educators never possessed them, either. Their struggle isn’t their fault—it’s the predictable outcome of an education system that failed them before they could begin. Some defend our failure by pointing to exceptions: “Look at Dr. X in Boston” or “See how student Y succeeded.” But these rare triumphs don’t validate our system—they condemn it.
When observing a Liberian office, you’re watching our educational crisis. Documents move at glacial speeds because reading comprehension is a struggle. Meetings drag endlessly because linear thinking is rare. Projects fail because planning abilities were never developed. The tragedy is that this manufactured incapacity feels normal to us. We’ve normalized a level of cognitive lethargy that would be unacceptable elsewhere. We’ve accepted what outsiders see as shocking inefficiency as our natural state. But this “natural state” is anything but natural—it’s the predictable outcome of our education system.
Breaking the Chains: A Pragmatic Path Forward
At our current pace of “improvement,” we’re 143 years from reaching today’s global education standards. Our children’s grandchildren would still be catching up—if the world were kind enough to wait. It won’t. We need radical surgery, not band-aids. Here’s what that looks like:
The Foundation: Teacher Excellence
Our priority must be revolutionizing teacher quality. One world-class teacher training institute to start, partnered with high-performing countries, can transform our educator workforce. We need rigorous certification standards and performance-based retention. The evidence from Vietnam, Kenya, and other success stories is clear: teacher quality is the lynchpin of educational transformation. Without excellent teachers, no other reforms matter.
Focused Curriculum Reform
We must resist the temptation to revolutionize everything at once. Our immediate focus should be mastering core subjects: reading, mathematics, and critical thinking; meaningful learning can only happen with this foundation. Once we establish strong foundations, we can layer on specialized programs and practical applications. Every curriculum change must answer one question: “Will this improve student learning?”
Strategic Resource Allocation
With limited resources, we must be ruthlessly strategic: 60% to teacher development, 25% to curriculum and assessment, and 15% to targeted infrastructure improvements. This ratio ensures we invest in people first, programs second, and facilities third. Singapore built a world-class education system with this approach—prioritizing teacher quality over physical infrastructure.
Systematic Cultural Change
Cultural transformation requires systematic pressure points. We can shift expectations by publishing school performance metrics, creating healthy competition through rankings, and engaging community leaders in governance. When parents can see which schools perform and which fail, and when communities take ownership of their schools’ success, excellence becomes non-negotiable.
Clear Timeline, Clear Accountability
Years 1-2 focus exclusively on teacher training reform and curriculum standardization. Years 3-4 scale successful pilots and implement the nationwide assessment. Years 5-6 launch centers of excellence based on proven models. Each phase must have clear metrics, transparent reporting, and real consequences for success or failure.
This is a challenging path. It requires political courage, unwavering focus, and a willingness to make difficult choices. But it’s a proven path. Countries like Vietnam, Estonia, and Kenya have shown that educational excellence isn’t about wealth—it’s about choosing the right priorities and relentlessly executing them. The question isn’t whether Liberia can transform its education system but whether we’re willing to make the hard choices that transformation requires. Our children can’t wait 143 years for excellence. They need us to act now, act strategically, and act with unwavering commitment to results. Tomorrow is already late.
Philip Pleiwon is a social entrepreneur and recognized human capital development expert. With experience leading education reform in six African countries, he is dedicated to empowering young Africans with skills to drive the future. He can be reached at [email protected]
