International Save the Children Alliance
The future of Afghanistan
The CEO of Save the Children in Norway, Gro Braekken, recently visited Afghanistan. We find out what the future of Afghanistan looks like...
More children start school, whilst fewer children drop out. What's more, they are learning more. Save the Children's village schools in Afghanistan are achieving some very good results.
"I like school. When I grow up, I want to be a teacher. Then I can pass on to other girls what I have learned, and help to build up my country. School is important for the future of Afghanistan", says Najiba.
She is ten years old and a member of the nomadic Kuchi people. But just now her family has settled temporarily with their sheep and many other Kuchi families in Letchapur, a little, straggling village outside Jalalabad in eastern Afghanistan. Save the Children started a village school there a year ago. The school has two classes, one for girls and one for boys. Neither of the classrooms has any furniture, just a blackboard. The pupils sit gathered close together on a carpet laid on the floor. Even so, no-one complains. Quite the opposite.
"It's great fun going to school! We have already learned how to read and write. I hope that all the children in Afghanistan will be able to go to school just like me. Then Afghanistan will be a better place to live in", says Najiba.
Education provides hope
When the Taliban lost power in 2001, there were hardly any Afghan girls studying at school, and fewer than a million boys. In the past five years more than six million children have started at primary school in the country, and a third of them are girls.
"There is a big difference between those who have had some formal education, and those who have not. An educated man thinks and knows. Education provides a light by means of which one can see clearly. In the past my people had only animals that accompanied us on our travels, but now our sons and daughters are going to school. Our daughters will be given the education that their mothers never had", says Haji Isakhan.
Collaborating with the Mullahs
In collaboration with the local religious leaders, Save the Children has established a total of 300 classrooms in small, Afghan villages. The local communities are responsible for building the actual classrooms and the protective walls round the schools. Save the Children pays the teachers's salaries and provides books and writing materials. In addition the teachers are able to attend classes in teaching methods that involve no forms of physical punishment but that encourage the children to play an active role in their own education.
The CEO of Save the Children in Norway, Gro Braekken, recently visited Afghanistan, and reports on the girls' motivation: "They have a very clear sense of what they want from their education. They want the means to contribute to the reconstruction of Afghanistan. And it's very encouraging that the girls have the support of the Mullahs. After talking to Save the Children, many of the religious leaders have understood that nearly all the elements in the UN Children's Charter are in general accord with the teaching of the Koran. They share the view of Save the Children that education provides hope for the future and maps a path out of poverty for both girls and boys".
"Save the Children collaborates with the Shuras (traditional local councils) and we explain to the religious leaders that more or less all of the UN Children's Charter can also be found in the Koran. If we are to succeed in educating the children - and especially the girls - in the Afghan villages, then we need to respect religious traditions and gain the support of the religious leaders and the elders of the villages", explains educational adviser Mohammad Hussain Hazim at the Save the Children office in Kabul.