Afghan education system sees marked improvement

Photo By Mark Fayloga | Although the school year began Sept. 5, no classes have been held at Khalaj High School in Nawa, Afghanistan. The school's headmaster said at least 200 students have registered to attend classes, but are waiting to start attending post Eid festivities. According to Maj. John Rinaldi, a team leader with the 3rd Civil Affairs Group, the first two weeks of school are seen as a registration period and he expects attendance to increase following the end of the Muslim holiday Eid al-Fitr, a celebration marking the end of Ramadan. Since the school year began, Marines and their Afghan counterparts throughout 3/3's tactical area of responsibility have provided security in Nawa DistrictÕs schools each day.  

CAMP LEATHERNECK, AFGHANISTAN

09.24.2010

Story by Sgt. Shawn Coolman  

Regional Command Southwest

CAMP LEATHERNECK, Afghanistan — Afghanistan faces many challenges as it continues to develop into a self-sufficient country.

One of the biggest concerns facing Afghanistan is the lack of an educational infrastructure. However, since the 2005-2010 National Education Strategic Plan was implemented, many advances in the education system have been made, paving the way for the 2010-2015 NESP, scheduled to be released later this fall.

“The education system in Afghanistan has provided the opportunity to a larger number of children, youth and adults to develop their attitude, skill and knowledge,” said Dr. Attaullah Wahidyar, senior program advisor and chief of staff of the Afghanistan Ministry of Education. “The curriculum also contains civic education and teaching principles of Islam, relating to current life.”

Much has been accomplished in increasing the amount of students enrolled in school during the past five years. In 2005, 5.4 million students were enrolled in school, and with additional school openings that number has risen to 7.3 million students now enrolled throughout Afghanistan, equating to 71 percent enrollment nationally for boys and 37 percent enrollment for girls in primary school.

To achieve this level of student enrollment, the MoE has implemented numerous strategies to attract students to the classroom including; awareness among the communities on importance of education through the media with publications by the MoE staff, establishing new primary schools in rural areas, construction of water and sanitation facilities, establishing school shuras, or meetings, that involve the parents and local elders in the education process.

More than 1,303 schools were planned to be constructed throughout Afghanistan, 2,281 schools have been constructed.

“The MoE strategy is to take the school to the children,” said Wahidyar. “Therefore, the plan is to establish smaller size schools to be easily reachable to the students.”

Even as recent as one year ago security was an issue in many areas, and 453 schools were closed due to insurgent threats, but with the Afghan national security forces taking on more responsibility for the country’s security that number is steadily declining with approximately 220 of the closed schools now re-opened.

“This has been made possible as a result of the MoE contacts, and outreach to the local shuras and spiritual leaders, coordination with and obtaining support of Afghan security [forces] to provide protection to schools,” Wahidyar said.

Traditionally, female students have not been allowed to attend school after the age of 12 if there is not a female teacher. The MoE has addressed this issue and is currently recruiting and training additional female teachers to increase female student enrollment in rural areas.

“We have been addressing this cultural issue by trying to increase number of female teachers while encouraging the parents to allow their girls to enroll in schools and continue their education,” said Wahidyar. “MoE has a plan to improve access to education in deprived areas, which includes the establishment of community based schools/classes, relocation of qualified female teachers [with spouse] from major cities to rural girl schools.”

To equalize the number of girls that attend school to that of boys, Wahidyar says it could take 10 years. To achieve this the MoE is doing several things including: projection and planning, awareness raising of importance of female education, encourage females to enroll in teacher training colleges with cash incentives to females in areas that lack female teachers and providing conductive learning environments with the building of new female schools.

Improvements in the quality of teachers have also been addressed through the MoE and progress has been made to improve teacher practices in the classroom, using better pedagogy, improvement in subject matter knowledge and improvement in class management and education planning.

Also, between 2005-2010, short term courses were given to more than 123,000 teachers on pedagogy, and subject matter teaching while an additional 20,000 teachers received diplomas through two-year in-service teacher education program through the 42 teacher training colleges throughout all the provinces.

The MoE has also set their sights on adult illiteracy, and created 47,268 literacy courses during 2007-2009, enrolling more than 1.1 million adults in the courses with 69 percent female enrollment, and more than 62,000 adults, 60 percent female enrollment in literacy courses in 2010, to date. In Helmand province as of 2009, there were 109,515 students enrolled in school with 1,387 teachers with 253 schools.

“The curriculum is not only focusing on subject matter knowledge and skills, but also helping the youth to develop their attitude as good Muslims, good Afghans and responsible citizens,” Wahidyar said.

• Date Taken: 09.24.2010
• Date Posted: 09.24.2010 10:21
• Story ID: 56907
• Location: CAMP LEATHERNECK, AF