Abstract
This study reports on a 2011 qualitative field study conducted at the Nigerian Turkish International Colleges (NTICs) in Abuja, Nigeria. The study uses both in-depth interviews and small focus groups to elicit the lived experience of six identified groups of stakeholders (administrators, teachers, students, parents, Nigerian leaders, and funders), and observations meant to explore the schools' role in promoting openness, mutual understanding, habits of discourse vital to democracy in a society that is deeply divided along religious, ethnic, and geographical lines. This article explains the value of school programs, such as the NTIC schools, in developing nations like Nigeria, and their role in promoting tolerance, unity, economic prosperity, and stability. This article also considers how these schools attempt to encourage the establishment of a civil society based upon democratic principles of governance while focused on multicultural values as dealing with the educational system of an African nation.
