Harvard University’s Graduate School of Education, in conjunction with the Harvard Advanced Leadership Initiative, held an AskWith Forum to discuss challenges girls face around the world while trying to access education, thus empowering the work of teachers, activists, and intergovernmental organizations to address these challenges.
The main speakers at the forum were Sakeena Yacoobi, CEO of the Afghan Institute of Learning, and Irina Bokova, Director-General of UNESCO.
Yacoobi shared a personal story regarding her success: “[My father] was very supportive of me, he encouraged me and I finished high school. I wanted to be a doctor.” Her journey to higher education brought her to the United States from Afghanistan.
She explained that Afghanistan at the time was not the one people are used to seeing on the news: “It was a beautiful Afghanistan. We were self-sufficient, we didn’t have beggars on streets, we were free, we could go from house to house…we could go to school, I went to school, there were universities.”
Yacoobi recalled terrible memories from her trip to the many refugee camps in Pakistan, where she saw widows with very young boys working to support their families. Fathers were not present due to death in the war or away fighting in Afghanistan. From her personal experience, Yacoobi learned that education is the key to resolve issues facing Afghans. She focused on starting schools within the refugee camps.
Due to the lack of trust and teachers in the community, starting schools was not an easy journey. Yacoobi observed the community and noticed that the most trusted figure in the refugee camp was the Mullah, a religious leader. She asked him to become a teacher. Even after the Mullah rejected the offer, Yacoobi did not take “no” for an answer, visiting his tent until finally convincing him to take the responsibility.
Yacoobi pointed out that the main success behind the effectiveness of the Afghan Institute of Learning was the people’s dedication: “It is the people who work from their heart and are hungry for education. They want to change, they want the transformation.”
She emphasized that gender equality involves both genders; that education truly transforms people. “The only solution in Afghanistan, or any part of the world, is through education. You educate the people, you solve the problem of ignorance, you solve the problem of poverty, you solve the problem of disease, you solve the problem of infrastructure. You need to educate the civil society.”
Dr.Yacoobi’s speech was followed by Irina Bokova’s talk on the importance of empowering women. Bokova provided the attendees with enrollment statistics of girls in schools and the pace of development. If the globe continued with the current pace discussed during the event, only by 2086 would a girl in a poor rural area of Sub-Saharan Africa be able to enroll in school.
Bokova explained that educating and empowering girls can resolve many issues such as child marriages, early pregnancies, and violence. She proposed more involvement from the health sector, educators, and community leaders.
The forum continued with attendees asking speakers and members of the Harvard Advanced Leadership Initiative questions about the topic. Most even shared their own stories of encounters with the issues in Brazil, Nigeria, Pakistan, and India.