The Ministry of Education in partnership with the Ministry of Youth and Culture have officially launched the cultural month in all nursery, primary, secondary and TVET schools, on February 2.
Since 2018, the month of February is observed as the cultural month in schools and during this period, students have exclusive discussions about the Rwandan cultural philosophy, values and language beyond what they are taught in class.
At the national level, the cultural month was officially launched simultaneously at Lycée Notre Dame de Citeaux in Nyarugenge District and Groupe Scolaire Kampanga in Musanze District.
Shedding light on the month, the State Minister in charge of primary and secondary education, Gaspard Twagirayezu said that during this month, every day before the beginning of ordinary classes, teachers will take some time to interact, and conduct dialogues about the Rwandan culture so students can learn more about the culture.
Other activities lined up during this month in all schools – public and private - include learning cultural dances, poem reading and cultural dialogues, among others.
"At the end of this cultural month, every school will be required to pick one day a month and dedicate it to cultural dialogues," Twagirayezu said.
"We brought this initiative in schools so we can cultivate a sense of patriotism, and teach our students how to uphold cultural values at an early stage, they already have the academic knowledge, but they need the cultural knowledge as well as the future generation” he added.
Twagirayezu tasked all school leaders, teachers and parents to dutifully observe this month and find time to teach the students about their culture.
While officiating the launch of the month in Musanze District, Edouard Bamporiki Minister of State in the Ministry of Youth and Culture said: "we want to explain to the students the Rwandan values, our culture and the history in order for them to understand the country, its creation, its vision and the role they are expected to play."
Bamporiki added: "Rwanda is a great project of our ancestors who wanted to build a powerful, long-lasting and wealthy country. And in order to realize that country, Rwandan children are required to keep away from foreign ideas, drugs and other divisionist ideologies."
Chloe Divine Gaju Mukamisha, a senior six science student at Lycée Notre Dame de Cîteaux said that as students they have a limited time to learn about the culture because much focus is on class work.
"When we come to school, our teachers focus on teaching us the sciences because they assume we already know enough about our culture, or they do not have enough time to teach us because we are following a timetable” she said.
Mukamisha also highlighted the problem of limited knowledge of the Kinyarwanda language where they find themselves struggling to know some of the words or their meaning because they spend most of their days speaking foreign languages.
"However, as students we welcome this month because we will be able to learn more about our cultural values, language and more new things that we did not know” she added.