OneWorld.net (U.S.)

KABUL, Afghanistan - Meet Farzana. She’s the principal of Sha Shaheed School, a school for girls who missed years of their education during the five years of the Taliban’s rule. The school is one of nine supported by CARE’s Out of School Girls Project that provides fast-track education for girls by teaching two years in one.

During the Taliban years, Farzana and her family fled to Pakistan, and she was able to work. However, after September 11th, her family moved back to Kabul and Farzana was able to keep working. She’s 28 years old and single, which is unusual for a woman her age in Afghanistan, and lives with her father. While her brothers and sisters are all married, she tells us that her father is open minded and encourages her to pursue her career.

The Sha Shaheed School teaches 360 girls who come in six days a week, either for the morning or afternoon, for their classes. Most of the girls are between 10-14 years old and were in school before Taliban, but had to stop going to school for five years when the Taliban didn’t allow girls to be educated.

These girls are now much older that the kids in their grade and CARE aims to provide a fast-track education so they can rejoin the school system at the appropriate age.

Mina is one of these students. She’s 15 years old, but she only finishing year three because under the Taliban she wasn’t allowed to go to school. Now, Mina and her peers are making up the lost years of school.

Mina has never been to school before. Under the Taliban, she had to stay home and care for her mother, who is sick, and do all the household chores. "I was so bored," Mina says, "and I didn’t have very much time to learn, even though sometimes my sisters would teach me a little bit." Mina’s three sisters and her younger brother have also gone back to school.

Mina’s family is Pashtun, the ethnic majority in southern Afghanistan, and Pashtun families are often more conservative. Under the Taliban, Mina wasn’t even allowed to go outside the house and she didn’t have any friends – just her sisters. "I love coming to school to be with the other girls and to learn. My favourite subjects are math and English," Mina says enthusiastically.

Some parents are nervous about sending their girls to school as it goes against the norm of the past several years, but Farzana reminds them that in the Koran it says men and women should be educated equally. She also encourages them to talk to other parents who have their children in the school and to see how happy the girls are here. After this little bit of encouragement, most of the parents are very supportive of the school.

Mina’s parents are happy she’s in school and really encourage her. They know her life will be easier if she is educated. Mina is still a bit worried that she’ll be much older than the other girls in public school when she finishes year six at this school and is reintegrated into the public system. But, she really wants to continue her education and hopes one day to become a doctor.

As an Afghan woman, Farzana says she’s proud to be helping girls gain an education and she works for all Afghan women. "This school wouldn’t be running without CARE and these girls wouldn’t be in school," says Farzana. "Most of their parents probably wouldn’t let them go to school at all because they were too old to be with the young kids in year one or two. But now, their parents are really happy their daughters have such an opportunity."

Source: Care USA