It is only fitting to reflect on the education history of PNG since the schools are beginning their new
academic year.

Before the missionaries came or even before any white man set foot on the shores of PNG
compelling natives the idea of formal education, there lasted the informal education in other words
traditional education.
Apart from the informal or traditional education which was obviously the dominant form of
education in the country, Papua New Guinea’s history of education show that there exists two other
know forms of education; the mission education and the colonial education.
Traditional education or learning was usually done in the form of observation, imitation and daily
interactions, without having to goto a formal school.
Come to think of it, most of the knowledge, life skills, attitudes and other important traits are often
taught or picked up through such approaches.
They included tribal law, play, and punishment, attitude towards human life, property and work and
even attitude towards sexual life.
These were considered “normal” in the mind of the native men and women as they had no idea or
the slightest bit of knowledge what “formal” education was.
This was to change when the missionaries arrived in the former territory of Papua. According to the
Unit 1: Foundation Studies in Education,missionaries were one of the three groups that managed
Papua New Guinea in the colonial era.
For the most part, their aim for Papua New Guinea was Evangelisation and that began the
conversion stage of education in PNG
When theyfinally introduced literacy and primary education, it was primarily to translate the Bible
and spread their religion to convert the indigenous people to Christianity.
Of course they had other aims such as: bringing civilisation through the teaching of western morals,
beliefs, and values.

Others were to create self-reliant Christian communities and to protect the locals from settler
exploitation and also produce pastors, catechists, teachers and skilled artisans in mission work.
Much later when the colonizers came, the dualism stage of education started. This was where
education was implemented by both missionaries and colonizers and the country became two
different territories governed by administrators.
Their views and interests in both British Papua and German New Guinea were economically and
politically motivated.
The government’s view on the education of the local population was to develop good agriculturists
and good carpenters, rather than good scholars. The actual responsibility of educating Papua New
Guineans was left to the missions.
In preparation for independence, many schools were built with the aim of preparing man power, this
was later called the expansion period.
After expansion the church and government established partnership to run the schools that they had
built which was known as the nationalism stage of education.
As this was happening, localization was seeping into Papua New Guinean minds and so began the
decentralisation stageoperation functions of primary schools, high schools, vocational and technical
schools were transferred to each of the 20 provinces by the National Department of Education.
The late 1980s and early 1990s and beyond can be called the education reformation stage and that
is that!
A short saga of the long multi-centennial history of education in PNG.