Irony of educated parents raising kids who can't change a bedsheet

There is a mystery unfolding in Kenyan households that deserves a national inquiry, preferably without sitting allowances. Parents who could neither read a newspaper nor write their own names somehow raised doctors, engineers, pilots, professors and judges. Today, some of those very professionals, armed with PhDs, master's degrees, luxury vehicles and impressive titles, are struggling to persuade their children to wake up, make their beds or carry a plate to the kitchen.

What happened? Did education improve the parents but confuse the children? Or did prosperity quietly enter our homes carrying a poisonous gift wrapped in expensive packaging?

In the 1970s, 1980s and early 1990s, the village alarm clock was a cockcrow. The first rooster announced the morning; the second confirmed it; and by the third, a mother had already concluded that the child was either late for school or preparing to become a village failure.

There were no negotiations with the pillow.

Children sprang out of bed, sometimes before breakfast, and disappeared along dusty paths with books under their arms. Some walked barefoot, not because it was fashionable, but because shoes were a luxury that had to be negotiated with the family budget. Hunger occasionally accompanied them to school, but it did not sit their examinations.

Their parents had never attended university. Some had never crossed the threshold of a secondary school. Yet they possessed an extraordinary curriculum: discipline, responsibility, respect, hard work and the conviction that education was the one inheritance poverty could not confiscate.

Their children were not entertained by expensive gadgets. Their playground was the village itself. At school, they played football, athletics, handball, volleyball, netball, rounders and skipping games. Outside school, there were tree-climbing competitions, rope jumping, hide-and-seek, wrestling, racing, swimming across streams, stone-skipping and improvised long-jump contests. Some became experts at tracking footprints, identifying birds and locating a hiding place before their friends had finished counting.

During famine, when an antelope was spotted in the distance, the village already knew its most accomplished tracker and sharpshooter. Nobody needed to circulate a CV. The young man had demonstrated his credentials through years of village competition. Even the antelope, had it understood the village hierarchy, would have requested a transfer.

Children helped cultivate farms, guided oxen pulling ploughs, fetched water and carried firewood. They knew that a meal did not materialise because somebody pressed a button. It came from soil, sweat and sometimes a stubborn ox that required more persuasion...

And somehow, amidst all this hardship, the village knew its promising children. So-and-so's son would become an engineer. Another would become a pilot. A certain girl would be the village doctor. Their academic abilities were public knowledge long before university admission letters arrived.

Then something happened. Those children grew up, went to university and became the very professionals who now occupy our hospitals, courtrooms, lecture halls, aircraft cockpits and engineering offices.

But here comes the mystery.

The professor returns home and discovers that his greatest research challenge is not artificial intelligence, climate change or constitutional interpretation. It is waking his own son.

The alarm rings once. Twice. Five times. Ten times. The young man remains peacefully married to his mattress. Eventually, the father enters the bedroom like a delegation seeking an audience with a head of state.

"Son, it is getting late."

"Five more minutes, Dad."

The father returns after fifteen minutes. Another negotiation begins. There may be a promise of a birthday present, an extra allowance or a favourite meal. In the old village, a mother needed only to mention the word school and the child was already outside looking for a missing pen.

Today's child may need a motivational speech, a financial incentive and a signed agreement.

The old parents sent children to school. Today's parents sometimes appear to be applying for permission to send theirs.

And the school journey has changed too. Yesterday's children walked through mud and sunshine. Today's are dropped off in comfortable vehicles, accompanied by hugs, kisses and instructions to study hard. They receive carefully selected diets, supervised playtime and negotiated sleeping hours. Some parents have become personal assistants to their children, following up assignments, attendance and even matters the children should have learnt to manage independently.

The child is not merely enrolled in school; the entire household appears enrolled alongside them.

Then comes the examination season. Parents contribute towards various school collections, sometimes labelled motivation, booster, activation, revision, remedial, academic clinics and other reassuring names. One wonders whether some schools are preparing candidates for examinations or operating a small vocabulary department for collecting money. Worse still, whenever parents or teachers facilitate cheating, they undermine the very qualifications they claim to be purchasing.

By university admission, the parents' job description has expanded into that of an admissions officer, travel agent, relocation consultant and interior designer. They apply for the course, arrange transport, accompany the child to campus, queue for registration and help arrange the hostel room. Some even demonstrate how to lock the door before leaving.

The mother departs in tears. The father drives away with the silence of a man who has just handed over a fragile national treasure.

Meanwhile, somewhere near the hostel, a fellow called Kevo, Brayo or Jonte is waiting to introduce the fresh arrival to the practical meaning of campus freedom. The parents have delivered a church-going daughter to university; the campus has scheduled her first examination in peer pressure.

In the 1990s, a student who received HELB money sometimes used part of it to support the parents, cultivate the family farm or educate a younger sibling. Today, some students struggle to distinguish between personal upkeep and the national budget. Their parents are expected to finance accommodation, entertainment, fashion, travel and a lifestyle that would make a cabinet minister request a supplementary allocation.

Of course, there are hardworking and responsible young Kenyans today, just as there were difficult children in the old days. But the culture of entitlement is increasingly difficult to ignore.

Some children appear to regard parental property as an advance inheritance. Before the parents have even retired, the family meeting begins:

"Dad, ukideady sahii, umetupanga aje?"

In the 1990s, asking a living parent about inheritance could earn a child a sermon long enough to qualify as a postgraduate course. The parable of the prodigal son was sufficient warning. Today, some seem more interested in the inheritance than in the father's continued good health.

And independence? In the old village, after initiation, a young man was expected to begin preparing for life beyond the parental compound. Today, some are approaching forty while negotiating continued residence at home, complete with meals, laundry and Wi-Fi. The parents may soon require a tenancy agreement to reclaim their own sitting room.

Perhaps the greatest difference is that the old village raised children collectively. An aunt, uncle, neighbour, grandparent or village elder could correct a child. Today, correcting somebody else's child may earn you a phone call from a lawyer, a social-media exposé and an invitation to explain yourself before a family WhatsApp committee.

We must not romanticise poverty or defend every harsh practice of yesterday. Children deserved protection, affection and dignity then, just as they do now. Nor should we confuse modern hairstyles, cosmetics, technology or changing fashions with moral failure. The real question is whether comfort has replaced responsibility, whether freedom has displaced discipline, and whether parents have confused providing for children with preparing them for life.

Perhaps our educated parents have become so successful at removing obstacles that they have also removed the opportunities through which resilience is acquired.

The village elder would say: If you carry a chick everywhere, do not complain when it grows up unable to scratch for its own food.

Our parents had little formal education but understood that a child must be prepared to face the world. We have accumulated degrees, property and technology, yet some of us are raising children who expect the world to be prepared for them.

The greatest irony is that our uneducated parents raised people who could change the world, while some of our educated parents are struggling to raise children who can change a bedsheet without supervision.

Perhaps the next national development strategy should begin at home. Before we build more universities, let us ask what kind of human beings we are sending through their gates. A country needs engineers who can build bridges, doctors who can save lives and professors who can generate ideas. But it also needs citizens who can respect others, work honestly, endure hardship and take responsibility for their own lives.

After all, the purpose of parenting is not to raise a child who will forever need a parent. It is to raise an adult who can stand when the parent is no longer there to hold their hand.

And that, perhaps, is where the old village still has something to teach us.