On the request of women participating in Afghans for Civil Society’s WIG Project ACS has started a home-based tutoring program for women and girls in Kandahar. Many international organizations measure Afghan women’s literacy rate at just 14%. After years of war and instability and with increasing insecurity in the region, many Afghan parents are reluctant to send their children to schools again.
One of the neighborhood centers for the WIG program is lead by an educated woman who is not allowed to work outside of her home. Her house is located in an area where none of her neighbors’ girls are allowed to go to public schools. Realizing her talent and the dire need for education, this center’s leader requested ACS to help her open classes to some 30 young girls in her home. The enthusiasm was so great that the little girls made themselves the regular black and white uniforms to come to their home school! The project is ongoing and girls have just finished 1st and 2nd grade textbooks and will be starting grade 3 soon.
ACS has stepped in to provide home-based literacy education and set up 6 literacy home-based centers, not only for young girls, but also for women denied their education by the Taliban. The women and girls in the home-based tutoring program are eager to learn and expand their opportunities. The program has increased students’ self-esteem and instilled a strong sense of pride in their abilities.
In one home-based school, 30 young girls now attend the daily classes at the private home of one of our income generation project participants. The enthusiasm of the girls is shown in wanting to attend school even on the weekends! Additionally, school supplies have been collected in Maryland and other parts of the USA and distributed to schools in Kandahar and Uruzgon provinces
For men seeking literacy education, Afghans for Civil Society has also set up a tuition scholarship program and helped students locate classes and courses.
By providing this program, ACS has acted to fulfill a vital demand for educating Afghanistan’s future.
