Posted on Jul 18, 2022
Secret schools enable Afghanistan's teen girls to skirt Taliban's education ban
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https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2022/07/12/ [login to see] /secret-schools-enable-afghanistans-teen-girls-to-skirt-talibans-education-ban
Inside a small room in a house on Kabul's outskirts, about ten teenage girls are defying their Taliban rulers who have banned them from attending secondary school. "Let's learn," one student slowly reads to another as they review English lessons from a textbook. "Learn the words: Yellow, blue, red, green."
The girls attend a secret school run by a young woman barely older than her students, 21-year-old Nazanin, whose lavender headscarf matched her nail polish on the day we visited.
"When the Taliban said girls can't go to secondary school anymore, I thought to myself, 'what can I do?'," she tells NPR. "How can I raise the morale of the girls around me?" She and the young students requested they only be referred to by their first names, to avoid being identified by Taliban officials.
It's been nearly a year since the Taliban seized power and stopped some 850,000 Afghan girls from attending secondary school, according to UNICEF figures. The regime had promised to allow girls to return on March 23. But it appears a minority of senior hardliners had a change of heart. Teenage girls arrived to their old classrooms only to be sent home again, many in tears.
Inside a small room in a house on Kabul's outskirts, about ten teenage girls are defying their Taliban rulers who have banned them from attending secondary school. "Let's learn," one student slowly reads to another as they review English lessons from a textbook. "Learn the words: Yellow, blue, red, green."
The girls attend a secret school run by a young woman barely older than her students, 21-year-old Nazanin, whose lavender headscarf matched her nail polish on the day we visited.
"When the Taliban said girls can't go to secondary school anymore, I thought to myself, 'what can I do?'," she tells NPR. "How can I raise the morale of the girls around me?" She and the young students requested they only be referred to by their first names, to avoid being identified by Taliban officials.
It's been nearly a year since the Taliban seized power and stopped some 850,000 Afghan girls from attending secondary school, according to UNICEF figures. The regime had promised to allow girls to return on March 23. But it appears a minority of senior hardliners had a change of heart. Teenage girls arrived to their old classrooms only to be sent home again, many in tears.
Secret schools enable Afghanistan's teen girls to skirt Taliban's education ban
Posted from npr.org
Children
Afghanistan
Taliban
Schools
Education
Posted 2 y ago
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PO1 William "Chip" Nagel
..."Zainab says Taliban authorities have informally allowed her to run the center, provided the girls obey strict dress codes. And they do: The teenagers filter in wearing black robes, headscarves and face masks.
The center offers classes for English and Quran memorization. The most popular course prepares girls for the college admissions test. It's unclear, however, if the Taliban will allow new female college entrants.
One top achieving student at Zainab's center, 17-year-old Sahar, says her current situation is not like school.
She's meant to be in grade 11. She goes to three different tutoring centers to round out her education. She leaves home at 6 a.m. each morning and races between classes. She worries her bag, filled with books, might attract hostility. "I get really scared when the Taliban guys see me. I change my routes," she says.
Some days, Sahar says, her morale collapses. "I've always wanted to be a doctor and until the Taliban took over, I was getting top marks. Now I've got no chance. She and her mother cry together sometimes, Sahar says, "because our future is so dark."
It's a deep sadness she says her mother shares. Because when the Taliban were last in power, her mother was a teenager. And she couldn't attend school either."
..."Zainab says Taliban authorities have informally allowed her to run the center, provided the girls obey strict dress codes. And they do: The teenagers filter in wearing black robes, headscarves and face masks.
The center offers classes for English and Quran memorization. The most popular course prepares girls for the college admissions test. It's unclear, however, if the Taliban will allow new female college entrants.
One top achieving student at Zainab's center, 17-year-old Sahar, says her current situation is not like school.
She's meant to be in grade 11. She goes to three different tutoring centers to round out her education. She leaves home at 6 a.m. each morning and races between classes. She worries her bag, filled with books, might attract hostility. "I get really scared when the Taliban guys see me. I change my routes," she says.
Some days, Sahar says, her morale collapses. "I've always wanted to be a doctor and until the Taliban took over, I was getting top marks. Now I've got no chance. She and her mother cry together sometimes, Sahar says, "because our future is so dark."
It's a deep sadness she says her mother shares. Because when the Taliban were last in power, her mother was a teenager. And she couldn't attend school either."
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PO1 William "Chip" Nagel It's been shown over and over again that if someone wants to learn there is no stopping them.
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