After visiting the teaching at the East African school in First Town, Maximilian I and his companion were deeply moved.
Great nobles of their rank had received royal court educations since childhood, making it difficult for them to descend into contact with such grassroots educational models as East Africa's.
Moreover, as a colony, East Africa had no need to hide anything from them. What the two saw was the most authentic daily reality of East African schools.
East African schools offered few subjects: German and mathematics were the two main courses, followed by history and physical education.
The content was also exceedingly simple, with a great deal repeated in every grade. After finishing school in East Africa, students could at most become proficient in German reading and writing and simple arithmetic.
The knowledge covered by the entire East African educational system was not even a third of what Ernst had learned in elementary school in his previous life—roughly a third-grade level.
This had been decided in order to accommodate the weak teaching resources of the East African colony. A colony like East Africa currently only had the means to provide this kind of impoverished education.
Of course, this education in East Africa did have a path upward. After passing the graduation examination, the most outstanding group could obtain opportunities to study in the German territories.
In terms of difficulty, it would have been extremely easy to pass the examination and secure a study-abroad place with the average elementary school graduate's standard from Ernst's previous life. It was simply that East African immigrants might not recognize the importance of education.
This meant that children from families that valued education had a greater chance of studying in Germany, while children from families that did not value it might remain in East Africa