The recent return of Taliban insurgents in Afghanistan’s southern provinces has also marked a return to many of the dangerous tactics utilized to restrict women’s access to education. Despite the devastatingly violent acts targeting many Afghan schools, especially the female students, it has been reported that hundreds of women are participating in underground education programs across the Zabul province.

The secret classes have been established in 29 villages and focus on teaching Pashto literacy, math, health, and hygiene. The schools’ primary organizer risks his life on a daily basis in order to smuggle textbooks and provide curriculum for women who seek an education. A private school in Kandahar city has also been established where Afghan girls utilize Skype to interact with and learn from teachers in Australia and Cananda.

The current underground education programs sprouting across Zabul resemble the covert education strategies utilized during the Taliban rule, which unfortunately suggests that similar anti-education strategies have once again been put into action. Perhaps more unsettling, however, are the recent speculations that some of the violent efforts to impede women’s education may have been organized and implemented by other Islamists not affiliated with the Taliban.

Despite the constant dangers Afghan women face everyday, the fact that women continue to risk their lives for an education restores a sense of optimism in a world of fear and uncertainty. WCI these schools, its founder and the Afghan women and girls who have persevered in the struggle for women’s rights and education.

For more information:
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/asia/afghanistans-women-defy-militants-to-learn-to-read-1936030.html