Afghan girls embrace school

Melanie Stetson Freeman – Christian Science Monitor – Thursday, 06 September 2012 (originally published 03 Sept)

Girls take notes in a home economics class. Girls from grades 1 to 9 attend the Speena Adi school in Kabul, Afghanistan, on April 8, 2012. Image:Melanie Stetson Freeman/Christian Science Monitor Staff

Under Taliban rule, fewer than 50,000 girls attended school in Afghanistan. Today, 3.2 million attend.

You see them all over town: girls wearing white head scarves over black clothes – their school uniform. It’s a welcome sign of progress. Under Taliban rule, fewer than 50,000 girls were in school. Today, 3.2 million attend. Two sessions a day are needed to accommodate all the students.

At Speena Adi school, 3,800 girls from first to ninth grade crowd into classrooms for four hours each day. They are the afternoon session in a building that was a boys-only high school during the Taliban years (1996-2001) . . .

. . . read complete article . . .

__________________________