: Finding Islam’s Place in Afghan Schools

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The events of the past year have turned the media spotlight on the education systems in post-Taliban Afghanistan and Pakistan. With the beginning of the new school year, everybody is trying to rewrite the (school) book, trying to make a place for Islam without allowing in militant ideologies. In Pakistan, a nuclear power that cannot educate its 68 million children, the Musharraf government is finally trying to reform the Afghan-dominated madrasas (Islamic schools), which teach mainly rote memorization and few, if any, job skills, and the US is offering to help “cleanse” the curriculum of violent rhetoric. In the meantime, Afghanistan’s new government has hired enough teachers to accomodate 1.2 million new students (including girls), and is similarly revising the curriculum. “We have removed any references glorifying war and Jihad, anything that reeks of violence and blood,” said one Afghan educator. The US is also joining in by creating partnerships between US and Afghan schools. With fears that America is trying to water down Islamic education, along with charges that the US is subsidizing religious education and violating the separation of church and state, the future role of Islam in these schools is still up in the air.

Shahed Amanullah is editor-in-chief of altmuslim.com.