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299 From Closed to Open Learning Systems Education had much in common throughout the Pacific when humans lived in small self-defending societies. It was largely learning by doing: an informal apprenticeship with parents or other relatives , supplemented by observing and imbibing the beliefs, values, traditions, and practices of the community. Where houses of learning taught skills to larger groups, these were usually families writ large, such as clans or lineages. Specialized knowledge was often secret. Medicine, magic, religious esoterica, navigation, even techniques for catching octopus or barracuda, were secrets passed on by experts to selected children or other close relatives. Knowledge was segregated by gender, by profession or craft, and in many societies by seniority or rank. Priests, craftsmen, and other experts trained some of their sons or nephews (but not usually all of either), and midwives, herbalists, and clothmakers their daughters and nieces. From the 1800s, such closed knowledge systems came in contact with more open systems that emphasized imparting as much knowledge as possible to as many as possible, so much of the content of the closed systems was lost within a few generations. For this reason, among others, global knowledge swamped indigenous knowledge. Sometraditionalknowledgethatwaslostisnowbeingretrieved from the only places it survived—museums, books, archives, and other foreign records. Wallis Islanders abandoned tapa (bark) clothing for more convenient cottons, but in the 1970s they wanted it for new functions such as the tourist market. Nobody knew how to make it, but the anthropologist Edwin Burrows had recorded the techniques and patterns in 1932. His book was sent for and translated and the craft recommenced. Some confidential knowledge is now being disseminated. Esoteric traditional medical skills are being recorded, published, and promoted as people realize that unless they are, they will be lost, as so much has been. Mission Schools Christian missions initiated formal education open to all and not based on kin. They blocked transmission of some traditional knowledge, but opened new windows. Protestants believed the Bible had to be read by each person, so they gave literacy top priority . For Catholics, only the priest could interpret the Bible to the masses. Thus, not until one hundred years after Catholic missionaries settled in Guam did the Spanish governor establish the first school for boys and another for girls, in 1771. Later, however, Catholic missions often did more for education than Protestants. The first schools in the South Pacific were set up by the London Missionary Society in the Society Islands in the early 1800s. One of them evolved into the Pacific’s first theological college. Its first major outreach was of Tahitian converts to the Cook Islands, where in 1839 Takamoa Theological College was founded to train missionaries to serve throughout the Pacific. They and others moved to Samoa, where Malua Theological College, founded in 1844, became the largest institution of higher education in the Islands outside Hawai‘i and New Zealand. Both Malua and Takamoa still function. The American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions’ seminary on Kosrae spread Christianity in eastern Micronesia. Catholic, Anglican, Methodist, Presbyterian, Seventh-day Adventist, Latter-day Saints (Mormon), Assemblies of God, Pentecostal , and other missions followed, each establishing some schooling . Churches remain a major source of education from kindergarten to college.1 An enormous range of small colleges offer theological courses for adults. Most are associated with U.S.-derived churches of the new Christian right and appear to attract disproportionate numbers from more isolated islands with little secular education. This is the reverse of the situation last century, when religious education was regarded as the best. Education Policies of Colonial Governments Missions preceded colonial governments in most cases by several generations. After colonial administrations were set up, missions continued to provide most schools, but under government control. Standards were generally low and curricula oriented to religious indoctrination, despite such outstanding exceptions as Tupou College , set up by Dr. J. E. Moulton in Tonga in 1866, and Leulumoega High School in Samoa, set up by the London Missionary Society in 1890. Both still function. 25 Education Ron Crocombe 300 ■ The Pacific Islands Guam was a partial exception. The U.S. Navy took the island in 1898, deported the Spanish priests, and took over all education. By 1914 Guam had perhaps the best education in the Islands outside Hawai‘i and New Zealand. High school began in 1917. The College of Guam, established in 1952, was the first postsecondary college in the Islands. During the Japanese administration in Micronesia (1914 to 1944...

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