Since the 16th century with the Jesuits there was organized effort to build an educational system in India. At the beginning of the colonization of India the East – India – Company didn’t intervene in the actions of the missionaries and the company itself didn’t build any educational system. Later, between 1813 und 1833, the company itself begins to build his own educational system and expanded it. The missionary schools had to deal with this development. Some of the missionaries were in favour with the help from the government, because when the school was part of the governmental program they got money from the country. But others wanted that their schools would stay independent. So they can teach the children what they want to teach them. First the schools had their attention especially on religious education. The more the schools worked together with the government, the more they had to teach subjects that were worldly, like maths, English, handicraft for the girls and so on. It wasn’t so easy to build an educational system like in Europe or America because the people first didn’t know such an education, but it was easier for the government because of the groundwork of the missionary schools.
The schools of missions were wide spread. You could find them in urban centres and in smaller towns. One author mentions, that at one point in history nearly 70% of high schools were run by missionaries. The mission schools were popular amongst Indians because in these schools there was in general a more moral tone than in the governmental schools and the mission schools could offer a more personal education than the governmental schools. There was a marginalization of proselytising, but therefore they characterized their schools through the comparing of religions. The teachers conversed in their breaks with the students of different religious groups. They also tried to show connections between Christianity and Hinduism.
One example for a missionary school in India is the Villa Theresa School in Mumbai. The Villa Theresa School is a highschool only for girls. There patron is the blessed Mary of the Passion. They have a song and prayer for her that is also published at their website. The principal of the school is Sr. Emy Rodrigues. She is principal since June 2015.
The schools want to promote good values and mould the character of the children. But also they are very proud because of the good grades of their students and they do much to support the students to get even better. They also have an anthem about their school and about the aim of the school, to raise the girls to independent women, who know what they want, but also are part of the society and helpful for her. You can also see here the moral character of missionary schools that I mentioned before that the Indians liked about these schools. The anthem is sung by all students together, I think which shows how much they associate with their school.
The website also shows that they have a hierarchy in their school. There students of the school are divided into four houses. Every house has a captain and an assistant captain. Also there is a head girl and her assistant; they are the connection between the principle and the students. Then there is the sports captain and her assistant. And at least there are a minister of culture, who informs the students about the news, and a minister of discipline, who for example checks the school uniforms of the students before class.
The Villa Theresa Highschool is a catholic school. Most of the students are either catholic or children from rich families because you have to pay a lot of money to attend the school and when you are catholic you get a huge discount. But the school is better than schools from the government because they have better teachers and infrastructure. Apart from that you can see the influence of the catholic missionary in the daily school life. There are many prayers and songs throughout the day and the students celebrate the catholic holidays. For Christmas the students prepared a theatre play and on other special days they get ice cream. Also they have longer Christmas breaks than the other schools.
The missionary schools are only one form of many different forms of schools that developed in India and exist nowadays.