Education PRISM Archives

From Killing Fields A small Philadelphia school grows hope in a poor Cambodian community

On a rainy spring morning in the Logan section of North other people.That’s why I think the gospel is so real, because Philadelphia, several dozen people squeeze into the narrow people don’t do that unless they share that understanding.” converted house that is Philadelphia Cambodian Evangelical The LHS graduation celebration is simple but sincere, Church. Most of the houses in the neighborhood are brick reflected by the church’s interior design.The sanctuary, located row homes, many of them with metal-barred windows or in what was once a living room, is decorated with burgundy doors; some are abandoned, their windows boarded up. The carpets and matching chairs, pale pink drapes, and a white people inside the church are mostly Cambodian children fireplace. In typical Cambodian fashion, the walls are white and and their families, all of them in bare except for a wooden clock attendance for the annual endon the back wall and the church’s of-year ceremony of Logan Hope banner with its name in Khmer School (LHS), a small, private and English. It’s a fitting place for Christian K-8 school that serves LHS’s ceremony — a place where mostly poor Cambodian and Christianity, education,American African American students from culture, and the Cambodian comthe local community. munity converge. There is nothAnita MacBain, 50, the school’s ing to distract from what is being co-founder and principal, is comcelebrated here: the future of mitted to breaking through culthese children. Academic success tural and educational barriers, is front and center here — a sharp committed to going the extra mile contrast to the way education in order to give these children a has been stigmatized in recent hopeful future. She remembers Cambodian history and devalone Christmas season when, havued in the Cambodian American ing observed a promising student community at large. flounder for a couple of weeks, she approached his mother to see The legacy of war what she could do to help. The Most Cambodians living in mother admitted that she didn’t America today are either refugees have money for tuition or for the or the children of refugees. Prior upcoming holidays. MacBain didn’t to 1975 few Cambodians resided hesitate. She rounded up a donatin the United States, but in the Anita MacBain surrounded by students at ed gift card and bought them a aftermath of the Vietnam War, a Logan Hope School. chicken and some vegetables so civil war, and the worst military they could have a Christmas feast. regime in the country’s history “I knew that did something,” says MacBain,“because when — Pol Pot’s Khmer Rouge — the once peaceful country of the student came back to school, he was willing to do his work. about 8 million saw up to a quarter of its population killed And I told him, ‘See, you’ve got to trust that God has a plan off through torture, starvation, disease, grueling labor, and and puts people around to help us out when we need it most.’ outright slaughter. Survivors fled for other countries, and tens It’s really precious to see the power of the gospel revealed of thousands of them migrated to the United States between not just through me but through the teachers and even the 1979 and 1984. Some came via individual and church sponstudents. I’ve seen students go beyond themselves to really help sorships, but the majority resettled with the aid of relief orgaPRISM 2010

22

Photos by Benjamin Edwards.

B Y P O L - PA U L PAT

to Learning Streets nizations and the government’s refugee program. Some ended up displaced in remote areas in the Midwest, but most settled in larger cities on each of the coasts: Long Beach, Calif.; Seattle and Tacoma, Wash.; Atlanta, Ga.; Washington DC; Lowell, Mass.; and Philadelphia.

Because of this horrific chapter in their history, many Cambodians remain skeptical about the value of education.

During the Khmer Rouge takeover, citizens were forced out of their homes and into the countryside, where they marched along dirt roads to an unknown fate. The communist soldiers would request their “biographies,” details which would determine whether an individual would be spared, taken to a torture camp or work camp, or immediately shot in an open field or by the side of the road.

Anyone with an advanced education — doctors, lawyers, teachers — had little chance of being spared.Those who caught on to the soldiers’ agenda lied about their occupations. Only a small minority of the country’s artists, writers, teachers, doctors, scientists, and community leaders escaped the “killing fields” of Cambodia.

Once relocated in the States, despite the lure of the “American Dream,” few of the refugees had respect for education. Most of them were rural poor and had little education to begin with — even by Cambodian standards — and thus saw little value in investing in an American one.

Even today, there are still many older Cambodians who barely speak English and seldom leave their homes. For many adults, education remains a dubious advantage; observed from a skeptical distance, it is seen only as an ancillary component of survival, an attitude which has unfortunately trickled down to the younger generation. Although some Cambodians have begun to change their view of education over the last decade, the Cambodian community still ranks among the lowest in high school graduation rates, college attainment, and median income.

A survey conducted by the United Way of Greater Los

Angeles in the 1990s reported that Cambodians finished last on virtually every social indicator, with 46 percent living below the poverty line. Lavinia Limon, director of the Office of Refugee Resettlement during the Clinton administration, told the New York Times in 2003, “The Cambodians are manifestly the greatest failure of the refugee program in this country.” Despite some projected progress for the 2010 census, the younger generation of Cambodian Americans — such as the students at Logan Hope School — still has a long road ahead.

The road to hope

Inside the church, MacBain plays master of ceremonies. A jovial woman with billowy gray hair, she sports large, aviator-like glasses. She welcomes the small crowd and passes off the microphone to her teachers, who take turns introducing their students and handing out achievement awards. Darrel Sing, 27, affectionately known as “Mr. D,” is one of five teachers at the school. The only male teacher, Sing instructs the kindergarten class. He has a cool, relaxed demeanor, an attribute shared by many of the teachers and staff.

“I think I made them cry a little more than my group last year,” Sing says half-jokingly to the audience. Everyone laughs.As he shares some of the challenges and highlights of the year, his six students stand bashfully in front of the crowd. He steals a glance at them, smiles boyishly, and says of his students, “I’m proud.”

There’s much to be proud of at Logan Hope School.The school, officially registered with the state of Pennsylvania and classified as Title 1, is associated with the nationwide Street School Network, a nondenominational network that includes secular schools as well. All schools in the network share the common goal of providing affordable education to students from at-risk communities. Like the other schools in the network, LHS runs mostly on donations, with only about 10 percent of the operational costs covered by tuition, currently at $40

PRISM 2010

23

From Killing Fields...

gone a huge overhaul, including a repurposed kitchen, renovated bathrooms, and updated windows, flooring, heating systems, and siding. When the student body began to exceed the building’s space, the MacBains designated the living room in their own home as a classroom, thus knocking down both the physical and metaphorical walls between their home and ministry life.

This whole-life aspect of the ministry is evident throughout MacBain’s day: She transports in the school van those children who cannot walk to LHS; she serves as principal and, if needed, substitute teacher during the school day and afterschool program hours; she cooks and cares for her own three children (all students at LHS) after school; and if anyone from the school or local community needs her assistance, MacBain often extends herself to help. (Neither Ken nor Anita receives a salary from the school; he works as a part-time pension consultant.) And in Anita’s “free” time, it’s likely that she’s mulling over what needs to be fixed next or how she’s going to raise the funds to pay her teachers — a growing concern in this shrinking economy.

a month per student. The network’s motto is that “street schools [are] the road to hope for at-risk kids,” and their website, StreetSchoolNetwork.org, underscores that while 7,000 US students drop out of school daily, 73 percent of the network’s students enroll in college.

Susan Boun, 14, a Cambodian student, is decked out for her graduation ceremony in a long red evening gown and silver heels. She holds a bouquet of red roses, looking more like a beauty pageant contestant than a middle school graduate.

Concerned with the high rate of dropout and teenage pregnancy among Cambodian girls in the neighborhood, Boun’s parents made a commitment to educating their daughter at LHS. Transferring in from the public school system as a second-grader, Boun needed lots of individual tutoring to catch up.“In the beginning I was below reading level,” she says, “but Logan Hope helped me to improve and love reading.”

Today she’s headed for one of the city’s top high schools as one of the many success stories found at the school.

When I grow up I want to be a photographer.

Being a photographer helps me express my emotions. A sunset amazes me by the shades of colors, the magnificence of the brightness it shows.

RAKSMEY YIM For MacBain, working with the Cambodian community in Logan is a providential calling. She describes herself as “very zealous” when it comes to sharing her faith: “I really believe Christ is the foundation of everything.” Beneath her motherly demeanor and evangelistic passion is a tough and street-smart woman, the result of living in this impoverished neighborhood for two decades. Her friends assert that

Whole-life ministry

MacBain met her husband, Ken, in an evangelism class at a megachurch in a wealthy suburb of Philadelphia. Soon the couple found themselves participating in various service projects.

Shortly after marrying in 1989, they moved out of the suburbs into a house in the Logan neighborhood. Dedicating much of their time to urban ministry — tutoring, leading Bible studies, and teaching English to immigrant adults—they began to see a clear need for better education, particularly for the children of the immigrant families they were working with. MacBain says she saw too many kids lost in overcrowded classrooms, lagging behind for lack of attention in the public school system.

The seed for Logan Hope School was planted.

In 1999, with the help of a few donors, the couple purchased an abandoned building next door to their house and began converting it into a functioning school building. Over the years, with the help of volunteers, the house has under-

PRISM 2010

24

faced in Logan, three of the members found such joy in serving the community that they’ve decided to stay in Philadelphia beyond their service time.

The second major change is that MacBain has assigned one of her teachers, 27-year-old Kim Roth, to replace her as head of development. After three years of teaching at the school, Roth has moved on to fundraising and networking, gathering more resources and support. She came to LHS after meeting the MacBains at church and moved to Philadelphia after having spent much of her life in the suburbs.

“I like living here better than the suburbs,” says Roth.

“People have issues everywhere, but here you can’t hide them.

I feel like people here are a whole lot more honest and real about stuff because they can’t hide.You know who has drugs coming out of their house. If someone’s using or fighting —

MacBain is not afraid to stand up to anyone, especially anyone doing wrong to the community. In situations where most people might look (or run!) the other way, MacBain will unapologetically engage — even if it is with a drug dealer — and threaten to call the cops. And it’s no different when it comes to obstinate parents; MacBain holds her ground.

A few years ago, she dismissed a student because his mother had been habitually disruptive; the woman also happened to be her neighbor and refused to speak to MacBain until recently. When recounting the incident, MacBain reaffirms the school’s slogan: L.O.G.A.N — Loving Our God and Neighbor. Of her firm philosophy towards difficult parents, she says, “You know, you have a choice — if you don’t like the way we’re going about teaching kids, you can take them somewhere else.”

“When I grow up I want to be a doctor.

Doctors are like magicians. They cure many people from sicknesses and diseases.

I want to help many people live a happy life without worrying so much about being sick.”

JOANNA OUK you can’t hide that.”

Like most of the other teachers, Roth had no official teaching experience prior to arriving at LHS; she graduated with a degree in recreation and leisure. However, she epitomizes the teachers at LHS, who share a common bond of dedication, passion, and sacrifice for the school and its students, things that MacBain says are more valuable than a teaching certificate or degree. And although she would love to raise teachers’ salaries in the future, currently they range from $16,000-$18,000, with health benefits. For some teachers, like Savorn Touch, a Cambodian American, who raises two children of her own, the salary can be faith-stretching.

Broadening the support base

MacBain admits to being worried about the sustainability of the school past her own involvement, and the extent of her involvement is such that she hasn’t had the time to find and mold her successors. To combat this problem, she has instituted two major changes of late. First, the school connected with Mission Year, an organization founded by Bart and Tony Campolo that sends out teams of young adults to serve inner-city communities. A staff of three men and three women from various places around the country, all in their 20s, moved into Logan in the summer of 2008 to assist MacBain and the teachers. They didn’t have to wait long to begin experiencing the challenges of inner-city life — including a homicide just a few houses down.

“Nobody’s fazed about the stuff that goes on here,” says Tina Kroona, who moved from Southern California to join Mission Year. “I’ll never be able to see life the same.” Initially she had envisioned herself as a missionary overseas but now says, “Why would I leave the US when there’s so much need here — in my own backyard?” Despite the challenges they’ve

PRISM 2010

25

to Learning Streets.

As the sole middle school teacher, Roth taught in the MacBains’ living room for the first two years and describes her first couple of weeks at LHS as an “insane” experience, which included a crash course in teaching — preceded by dry-walling her classroom just a few days before school started.

In addition to teaching, the instructors often counsel and mentor the students. Working with an at-risk student population, the teachers at times encounter gripping cases of abuse, violence, and poverty. During an incident last year, two students — a fourth-grader and an eighth-grader — walked into a local pizza store where they were held at gunpoint by a robber; fortunately they survived the ordeal. Other students have had to move into foster care because of abusive home situations. And most students, particularly the ones from Cambodian families, struggle simply with the adaptation of their families into mainstream American culture.

“I love the students at Logan because I can have an actual relationship with them,” says Roth, who, rather than advising her students to escape inner-city life for good, instead tells them, “Go get yourself an education so you can come back and help everyone.”

titution rings and of families living in pitched tents on the country’s landfills. And only recently have some of the parties responsible for the Khmer Rouge’s crimes against humanity come to trial — small solace for these bereft people.

To close out the graduation ceremony before a potluck lunch is served, MacBain prays a simple prayer: “Father God, thank you for this year.We couldn’t have done it without you, Lord. Amen.”

At the end of the first chapter of the book of James, Christ’s followers are instructed to care for the orphans and widows of the world. In our globalized world today, where the tremors of one nation’s war send out ripples throughout the world, we may find this mandate more challenging than ever before.

How can we care for all these people? And what is our responsibility to a country after it has been torn apart by war — perhaps even by the hands of our own country’s citizens?

For those who remain, what is their hope?

If there are any signs of hope, perhaps it’s growing inside a shabby school building in the Logan section of Philadelphia, where folks from all walks of life are coming together to restore promise to a people who have lost it time and again.

“The reason I do this,” says MacBain,“is because I see lives change. And that’s what it’s all about.” Q

Seeing lives change

Today, Cambodia struggles to regain its identity after being decimated by a long period of bloodshed. By some estimates, roughly three-quarters of the population is under the age of 30 and about half of the families are fatherless. Recent news headlines about Cambodia depict the atrocities of child pros-

The son of Cambodian refugees who came to the United States in 1984, Pol-Paul Pat is a freelance writer and an assistant professor of English at Delaware County Community College in Media, Pa. He can be reached at ppat@dccc.edu.

The most important thing in my life is getting through school, helping my family when I get older to work, and being a good example to others. I want to show others who think I can’t what I am capable of in life.

SAMANTHA YIM PRISM 2010

26

Dundanim/Keith Hoffart

Meeting God in the Margins

Tierra Nueva combines discipleship training, spiritual deliverance, and advocacy to bring healing to both the lost and the found. b y A llison D u ncan

PRISM 2009

23

Meeting God in the Margins and they — along with the peasants they taught — rediscovered the gospel.

This communal discovery of grace is at the heart of the Ekblads’ ministry today. In 1982 they founded Tierra Nueva, a ministry birthed in Honduras that later expanded to western Washington. In the city of Burlington, they established the People’s Seminary, an ecumenical organization that seeks to share the good news of God’s liberation in Jesus Christ with both privileged and underprivileged people. Among their ministrants are migrant farmworkers, new immigrants, and permanent Hispanic residents in western Washington.

“At the heart of Tierra Nueva’s mission is that mainstream people and those on the margins would hear and experience together the very good news of God’s love and liberation in Jesus Christ,” states the website. Through this ministry, both majority and marginalized people discover the gospel of grace and are affected by it through Bible study, healings, spiritual deliverance, and social activism.

As director of Tierra Nueva, Bob Ekblad teaches at the People’s Seminary, leads Bible studies among prison inmates and migrant workers, co-pastors bilingual faith communities with his wife and others, and intercedes for people. Ekblad points to Gustavo Gutierrez, Peter Maurin, Carlos Mesters, and Gerald West as theologians whose ideas have inspired and helped shape the ministry.

Gutierrez’s and Mesters’ writings challenged Ekblad not to assume that he understood Scripture but to be evangelized along with the poor. Maurin wrote that scholars and workers needed to labor, reflect, and pray together, developing a “workerscholar synthesis,” and West encouraged training the disadvantaged to think critically.

“Bring the best to the least,” Ekblad says. “Bring what you think is good news from the academy to the marginalized.”

According to Ekblad, this good news will refresh both teacher and students, and it may take on deeper or different meanings as the teacher considers it in the context of the underprivileged.

In this vein, Ekblad teaches marginalized and mainstream students in the People’s Seminary about the gospel that they all need, equipping them to share it and to demonstrate it through service.

Practical challenges accompany this work. Migrant workers often have erratic, exhausting schedules during harvest, and some have never finished high school. So Ekblad and other Tierra Nueva staff mentor people one-on-one and offer different levels of teaching.

The work requires Ekblad to be aware of his assumptions so that he doesn’t reinforce negative images of God. Rather than implying that God is an oppressive judge, which Ekblad fears Christians do too often, he teaches that Jesus is the friend of sinners who forgives and heals them even before they confess.

Troubled by the legalistic interpretations offered by Honduran members of the Bible study they led, Bob and Gracie Ekblad prayerfully proposed a new rule: Members could only discuss what the text said about who God is and what God has done for them, rather than what the text said they had to do to get right with God. Already under strain from living in poverty among Honduran peasants, with impending burn-out from the demands of teaching health and sustainable farming, the Ekblads faced further challenges in confronting local church teachings. The Honduran churches in the 1980s were hotbeds of legalism, each trying to outdo the others in sanctimoniousness and shunning peasants who couldn’t keep up with the long list of regulations. Consequently, the Ekblads’ Bible study members had a monochromatic view of Scripture as a rulebook.

But when the Ekblads introduced their topic restriction, the tyranny of church rules began to crumble. God’s mercy flowed over the Honduran group members and began to free them, filling them with joy. In watching this renewal, the Ekblads were likewise set free from burdens of guilt and duty,

PRISM 2009

24

Tierra Nueva’s teaching and social advocacy ministries help immigrants and inmates to see that God loves people like them. They read the Bible for the first time. They begin to learn how to hear good news.

Tierra Nueva’s teaching and social advocacy ministries follow this model, Ekblad says, helping immigrants and inmates to see that God loves people like them. “A lot of people begin reading the Bible for the very first time, and they’re learning how to hear good news,” he says. Ekblad and other staff accompany them as they learn, providing pastoral support, biblical teaching, and healing prayer.

“Sometimes there are blocks that need to be removed so people can hear good news,” Ekblad says. So in addition to these other ministries, he and the staff listen and address people’s wounds and sins through intercession for healing and deliverance, calling on the Spirit that raised Jesus from the dead.

They have seen many freed from work- and gang-related injuries, tormenting dreams, rage, anxiety, and addictions.

“It’s not enough just to do social advocacy,” Ekblad says.

“A man might get free from jail for a criminal offense, but if he doesn’t get free from his rage, he might kill his girlfriend.

Social advocacy goes hand in hand with being able to administer healing to people’s hearts through inner healing and deliverance ministry.”

“It doesn’t work to operate out of a single stream,” says Ekblad of Tierra Nueva’s ministry. “We need the whole body of Christ.” Isolated from each other, evangelistic, social advocacy, and healing ministries aren’t enough; although they may appear successful at first, no one approach can offer lasting rescue and healing from problems as severe as life sentences, domestic violence, and heroin, meth, and crack addictions.

The body of Christ must be more reconciled in order to bring the gospel of truth, love, and liberation that people need, Ekblad insists.

To illustrate the multifaceted approach of Tierra Nueva’s gospel-rooted ministry, Ekblad recounts his October 2008 visit to Guatemala to train servants of the poor and to minister to gang members in violent prisons. A few days before leaving, he dreamed of a gangster covered with tattoos and with a hole in his side. He was learning about walking in the power of the Holy Spirit, and he wondered if this dream was related to his upcoming trip.

Ekblad and a team of four other men passed guards armed with machine guns to enter a Guatemalan jail. “It’s a chaotic environment,” Ekblad comments, with some inmates smoking marijuana, answering cell phones, arguing, or sleeping with prostitutes — distractions with which the team competed while inviting the men to a Bible study. Ekblad has compas-

sion for these men, many of whom come from Christian homes but lost fathers in the war of the 1980s and subsequently joined gangs and began selling drugs.

“Gangs run the prison from the inside,” Ekblad says.

Gangsters may kill fellow members who become Christians, because they see conversion as joining a rival gang — the church. Churches sometimes perpetuate this perspective by pulling gangsters away from their familiar gang community and bringing them into an exclusive, legalistic group, explains Ekblad. Local prison chaplains wrestle with how to prevent violence against those gang members who want to follow Christ and still provide the Christian community and discipleship they need.

Ekblad saw a gangster who resembled the one in his dream, with tattoos and a large scar. He stopped to ask the man where the bathroom was, and a conversation ensued. Ekblad gradually learned the man’s name was Piranha and that he was a top gang leader with a 132-year prison term.

“Would you like to see my cell?” Piranha asked humbly.

The offer surprised Ekblad, but he gladly accepted. During their conversation in his cell, Piranha revealed that he knew he

Migrant workers and their families are an important part of the Tierra Nueva community. Photos by Bailey Tanaka

PRISM 2009

25

Meeting God in the Margins needed God. Ekblad told him about his dream and gave him a worship CD and a copy of his book, Reading the Bible with the Damned (Westminster John Knox Press, 2005), about biblical interpretation from the perspective of the condemned.

Piranha gladly accepted the gifts.“He opened up and received a lot of love,” Ekblad remembers, astonished at the hardedged gangster’s response. He prayed with Piranha, asking that God’s peace and presence would fill his life.

Piranha’s presence with Ekblad gave the team credibility, and they were able to gather about 40 inmates for the Bible study. One team member sang songs of deliverance as Ekblad got permission from the men to lay hands on them and pray.

Music broke through the din of the prison, and gentle human touch softened men accustomed only to rough contact.

The text the group studied was the calling of Matthew.

Ekblad described how hated Jewish tax collectors were because of their extortion crimes against their own people.

“Who might fit the description of tax collectors today?” he asked. The inmates exchanged glances and smiled knowingly.

Ekblad knew that most gangsters earn money by imposing tariffs on neighbors, threatening to kill them if they don’t pay.

These men saw a reflection of themselves in Matthew.

“What was Matthew doing when Jesus called him?” Ekblad

been welcoming Jesus through our presence with them.”

The group looked at Jesus’ response to the Pharisees’ disdain. Jesus dismisses the hypocrites, those commonly seen as healthy, and identifies himself instead with the sick, recruiting them as his friends and followers. Rather than feeling offended at being considered sick, the gangsters acknowledged their need for healing. They appeared to welcome the truth that Christ valued them and desired to be with them.

“What would you need to be healed of if Jesus were here right now?” Ekblad asked them.While they didn’t dare answer openly, Ekblad and his team laid hands on these men and prayed for their healing.

As they left the jail, the team thanked the jail warden.

Ekblad acknowledged the difficulty of the warden’s work and asked if they could pray for him. The warden agreed and, in a spontaneous gesture of vulnerability, pulled his gun from its holster and bullets from his pockets, disarming himself before the team. They asked God to give him wisdom in his job and asked for healing for the burning pain across his shoulder, arm, and chest from a machete injury. “All the pain is gone,” he said after they prayed.

During the remainder of the trip, Ekblad and his team taught a group of ministry workers about forgiveness and

Gangsters may kill fellow members who become Christians, because they see conversion as joining a rival gang — the church. continued.To their surprise, the men discovered that he wasn’t going to church or doing anything religious. He was stealing from his people when Jesus approached him. “What does this reveal about Jesus?” Ekblad pressed, helping them to realize that Jesus lovingly pursues sinners, even while they are practicing sinful behavior.

“Do you think Jesus is calling you to leave your gang?”

Ekblad asked. The men shifted uncomfortably, guessing which answer Ekblad was fishing for, but he surprised them by pointing to the verse where Jesus goes to Matthew’s house to eat with him and other sinners.

“So who follows whom?” Ekblad asked, watching the men’s reactions. Jesus is the one who joins Matthew’s crowd, the inmates discovered. It was an insight Ekblad had only recently received, and one that he is sure God gave him specifically for these gangsters.

Looking at Piranha and another gang chief, Ekblad asked a further question: “So what do you think — would you let Jesus into your gang?” Although the men were wary of making a positive response in front of their gang, Ekblad sensed their wonder and openness. Ekblad remarked later, “I had just come from praying with Piranha in his cell. Already they had

prayed for God’s Spirit to refresh each of them. The team marveled at how God was renewing all of these people— inmate, warden, and minister alike.

Through diverse ministries like these, Tierra Nueva seeks to bring the evangelistic, charismatic, and advocacy streams of the church together. In this unified body, the powerful and the poor discover and experience the gospel together.

“I see more and more Christians becoming excited about ministry to people on the margins,” Ekblad says. In the process, they become more won over by God’s love, he adds.

“That’s one of the major fruits — being evangelized in the whole process ourselves as we discover the good news alongside people.” n Learn more at Tierra-Nueva.org.To purchase Ekblad’s book, Reading the Bible with the Damned, or to read a sample chapter, visit Tierra-nueva.org/Publications.html.

Allison Duncan works as a marketing assistant in Broomall, Pa. She has a BA in English and theology from Eastern University, and she enjoys using her training in both these fields to interpret the good news in biblical stories.

PRISM 2009

26

A NEW DAY IN A COMMITTED CITIZENS TOIL TO THROW OFF OPPRESSIVE TRADITIONS, EDUCATE GIRLS, AND INTRODUCE A NEW AGE TO A WAR-WEARY LAND T E X T A N D P H O T O G R A P H S B Y M A R Y K AT E M A C I S A A C

S

eated in the front row of a crowded classroom, squeezed between a host of other students dressed in white head scarves and black uniforms, Khalida, 9, shares her Dari language exercise book with a classmate. Her dark brown eyes move between the text and her teacher, as students take turns reading aloud, and the teacher, a woman in her 30s, corrects their errors. Outside a bell clangs. Class is over.

Students quickly close their books, deposit them in their backpacks and handbags, and hurry for the door. Without space between desks for an aisle, girls clamber up and over the furniture.The hallway outside is filling with voices and laughter.

It’s only noon, but the first shift at Naswan Girls School in Qala-i-Naw, Afghanistan, has ended and the second will soon

begin. Six years ago, after the fall of the Taliban, only 300 students dared register at Naswan. Today, there are almost 3,000.

Khalida can’t recall how she passed her days prior to beginning studies at Naswan Girls School, the largest of its kind in Badghis Province, bordering Turkmenistan in the northwest corner of the country. Khalida wasn’t yet born whenTaliban forces rolled into town in October 1996 and, without encountering any resistance, took the provincial seat of power. A month earlier, the capital city of Kabul was taken by force. Imposing a series of draconian laws, the extremist regime forbade women to work or even show their faces in public, and while boys were allowed to study a limited curriculum of religious studies, all girls’ education, primary through university, was banned.

PRISM 2007

8

pgs 01-40.indd 8

6/19/07 10:19:01 PM

N AFGHANISTAN Khalida’s mother, Fatima, 27, remembers it well. She was one of thousands of young women forced to quit school.

“When they shut down the schools, I was so sad, so disappointed, and so afraid. I had dreamed of an education....” her voice trails off. “They stole that.”

Khalida and her mother have witnessed this progress, for they are two of the 5.1 million students participating in the Afghan education system, reestablished after decades of devastating war. Students have returned to classes in droves, and 1.7 million girls, discriminated against under the Taliban, are now learning to read and write, some continuing their studies through high school. Thanks to a renewed push by the Afghan government and international donors, education is now among the nation’s top priorities.

World Vision’s programming in Afghanistan concentrates on the integrated well-being of families and includes efforts in health, food security, water and sanitation, gender equality, and a particularly strong education component. World Vision began relief efforts in Afghanistan six years ago, after the toppling of the Taliban in the fall of 2001. Starting with the

TOWARDS THE MILLENNIUM GOALS

Today, 60 million girls throughout the world are unable to access education. Two-thirds of children denied primary education are girls, and 75 percent of the world’s 876 million illiterate adults are women. But the United Nations hopes to see such statistics dramatically reversed. In the third of its Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), set forth at the UN Millennium Summit in 2000, world leaders pledged to promote gender equality and empower women.The UN’s Gender Development Index (reflecting levels of disparity between women and men) places Afghanistan above only one country in the world, Niger.

While more than 90 developing nations are on course to meet the MDGs by 2015, the Afghan government has set a target for eliminating gender disparity in all levels of education by 2020. Ensuring equal educational opportunities for girls and boys is an important step in eliminating gender discrimination.

As security weakens in the face of a resurgent Taliban, Afghanistan is struggling to meet its formidable goal. Despite ongoing setbacks, including death threats to teachers, the burning and bombing of schools—particularly in, but not limited to, the south—the country has made astounding progress.

Opposite: Masturah, a community development worker, goes from village to village encouraging girls to attend school and women to join literacy classes.Tribal codes prevent her from travelling without a male relative. (Photo by S. Ferretti) Right: Looking towards a new future:Young women peer from the window of a literacy class in Qala-i-Naw. Although Afghan women currently have the lowest literacy rate in the world, things are slowly but surely changing.

PRISM 2007

9

pgs 01-40.indd 9

6/19/07 10:19:16 PM

compulsory for all children. But poverty remains a huge obstacle, and declarations made on paper and legislations of an elected parliament far away in Kabul are not enough to change hundreds of years of culture, especially in the most rural isolated mountain and desert communities.

Seemaghul Ahmadi, 30, is the principal at Naswan School and the mother of five. She was in 11th grade when the Taliban outlawed girls’ education. For six years she didn’t attend classes.

But the fundamentalist regime wasn’t the beginning or the end of her problems. At 16, years before the Taliban assumed power, Seemaghul’s family married her to an illiterate man.

“After I married I had to quit school. My husband was good, and he agreed that I should continue my studies, but his father did not.” For months she remained in the house. Only after her father-in-law’s death was she permitted to return to class.

Today, Seemaghul continues the struggle within her own family. Her brother-in-law forced his sister (Seemaghul’s sister-in-law) to quit school after seventh grade, despite her obvious interest and talent, and refuses to allow her to return. “The family is completely illiterate. They do not easily allow girls to be educated,” Seemaghul explains. “Even when I am the headmistress of the school, they are like this.

They don’t recognize the importance of education.They are like the deaf. They cannot hear. ‘One educated woman is enough,’ my brother-in-law says. I love my work, but I suffer from the side of my family.”

Experiences like Seemaghul’s are not uncommon. Similar cultural and social attitudes are prevalent among Afghans in Badghis Province.Teachers say that many female students are unable to complete their education due to early and/or forced marriage. Nearly 60 percent of girls are married before their 16th birthday. Girls in rural areas marry younger, closer to 11 or 12. Oxfam reports that only one in 20 Afghan girls attends school beyond grade six.

Too often Seemaghul must visit families on behest of a student, asked to convince the girl’s family to let her finish school. “When a girl becomes engaged she belongs to two families,” the headmistress explains. “We first talk to her father and then go the husband’s family.” She says she is rarely successful.

Sayed Jamaluddin Ayoubi, 28, World Vision’s education project coordinator and a native of Qala-i-Naw, says these cultural attitudes are the biggest barrier to gender equality today.

He points to deep-seated tribal codes and basic ignorance as root causes of gender disparity. “People compare the benefits of education to the shame of allowing their women to walk in public through the center of town on their way to school.”

Clearly frustrated, he cringes and scratches his bearded chin.

“According to culture, it just shouldn’t happen. A woman shouldn’t walk through the bazaar. Shame wins.”

Students enter the school compound on their way to class at Naswan Girls School in Qala-i-Naw. Female teachers and students over the age of 12 wear the infamous blue burqa to shield them from the view of men in the streets.

rehabilitation and construction of schools throughout western Afghanistan, the agency expanded into longer-term development with a strong focus on education programming. By 2003, in cooperation with the Afghan Ministry of Education, and funded by the United States Department of Agriculture “Food for Education,”World Vision began a five-prong School Enhancement Program in the western provinces of Badghis and Ghor. A multimillion-dollar program, it aims to encourage student enrollment and retention through monthly food package incentives, uniforms and school supplies, teacher training courses, school construction, and women’s literacy classes.

THE OBSTACLES

Much has been accomplished in girl-child enrollment in the last six years, but the elimination of gender disparity in Afghanistan remains an uphill climb. Despite a 500 percent increase in school attendance, more than half of Afghan children—some 7 million—do not go to school, the majority of them girls. Only one-third of children in school are girls, and, despite an overall increase in enrollment, the gap in enrollment between boys and girls remains.

The obstacles to improving educational opportunities for girls are many. Families and teachers cite a number of reasons why more girls aren’t in school—among them poverty, proximity to school, violent conflict, and culture.

Poverty levels in Afghanistan are extreme. The Human Poverty Index lists Afghanistan above only Niger and Burkina Faso. The Human Development Index shows Afghanistan at 173 out of 178 countries surveyed.

Families with little or no income are compelled to keep their daughters at home, subsidizing the family earnings by shelling pistachios, weaving carpets, or embroidering. Officials say that school tuition in Afghanistan has been abolished, but many schools continue to charge fees. The new constitution declares the girl-child’s right to education, and grades 1-9 are

PRISM 2007

10

pgs 01-40.indd 10

6/19/07 10:19:28 PM

A HISTORY OF VASCILLATING

the separation of male and female into public and private spheres: men in the streets, the schools, the workforce, and women kept in the home. The rights of women and girls in Afghan society have vacillated between imposed modernization and the conservative backlash it invites.

“Our history is a zigzag of back and forth,” says Qasim Wahdat, 54, assistant area manager for World Vision in Qalai-Naw. “Girls are so very, very vulnerable in our society.

World Vision’s work here is important. We can’t go back to that dark time,” he adds, referring to the five-year period under the Taliban.

But the vacillation continues as schools become symbolic soft targets for an insurgency set on destabilizing the government. More than 300 schools were attacked last year; several hundred more were closed due to fear of attack.Throughout the country, some 200,000 students were shut out of school because of conflict or fear of conflict. An Afghan soldier stands outside the wall surrounding Naswan Girls School, positioned there by the governor after a rocket attack last year. For two weeks, girls didn’t come to school.Threats scribbled in chalk at the front of classrooms have caused some teachers and students to question whether to return. But at Naswan, the 77 teachers and nearly 3,000 students continue to come.

Abdel Aziz says the conflict has a negative affect on education. “In addition to our cultural problems, we have this business of war. Three decades of it. War has sown so many

Seated on a cushion in the salon of his home, Khalida’s father, Abdel Aziz, 38, smiles with pride at his eldest daughter, squatting on her haunches next to him. “All of my children, like Khalida, will go to school. The girls and boys.” Stroking her head, he adds, “There is no difference.” He is better educated than most Afghans. After high school, he attended college in Russia.

“So many people in Afghanistan remain illiterate even though education is free.Those who are illiterate don’t realize the benefits of education. Unfortunately, they are under the influence of culture and tradition.”

His wife, Fatima, who, under the Taliban, was forced to quit school, has since returned to her studies. “My life was different from other girls’. Their families didn’t approve of school. But first my brother encouraged me to study, and then my husband.” This year Fatima, a mother of four, will complete grade 12. Next year she hopes to continue studies at a local teacher’s college. “I want to help my community by participating in it,” she explains, her nursing son cradled against her. “If I’m educated, I can do that better.”

Almost 30 years ago, Abdel Aziz’s parents moved with other families from their village homes in Pada Nuqdari to Qala-i-Naw. They wanted their children to attend school.

“The village people called us qafir—infidels or nonbelievers —because we believed in education,” he laughs, remembering the ridiculous accusation made years ago. “The mullahs [religious leaders and not necessarily educated], especially those belonging to the mujahedeen [militias fighting the Russian army], wanted the people to follow them.” Using language of heresy was an easy way to divide the people and sway opinions. He says there remain some men who compel others to keep their girls at home. “This is a conversation that needs to end.”

The conversation in question has been ongoing for more than a century. Attempts to introduce social transformation, particularly for women and girls, are not new. In the late 1800s, Afghan leaders tried to implement liberal laws, some of the first in the Muslim world, towards the emancipation of women.

InRalph the 1920s, King Amanullah called for social and political Winter modernization—demanding that all women remove their veils.

His attempts were met with violent opposition, and in 1929 he was overthrown. In the 1960s, in the country’s first elections, women were voted into Parliament, but the government did not last. In the 1980s, the ruling communists prohibited women from wearing the burqa and introduced coeducational primary schools. These schools were closed or destroyed when, with Western support, the mujahedeen brought an end to the Soviet occupation. Change was incremental and progress always short-lived. In fits and starts, committed Afghans have attempted to change centuries of ingrained culture that demanded

Literacy instructor Nisreen Meer, 28, uses illustrations depicting good health, nutrition, and hygiene to teach women how to better care for themselves and their families as they also learn to read and write.

PRISM 2007

11

pgs 01-40.indd 11

6/19/07 10:28:34 PM

problems for girls, especially in relation to education. Security is one of the greatest obstacles to education. People are fearful.

We may see the end of gender disparity in Afghanistan—one day,” he says, looking at his daughter, Khalida. “But if the situation deteriorates, it won’t be good for any of our children or for Afghanistan.”

“We do need peace, more than anything,” says Ayoubi.

“We need it for our families, for our people. If there is no peace, there will be no education, no equal opportunity. We will be in darkness. Our people will remain at the bottom.”

It is the first time these men have sat at the foot of a female teacher. Farishta is a principal at the local Naswan Girls School, where she shares duties with Seemaghul Ahmadi.“At first they could only stare at me in shock,” she smiles, recounting her first day of training. “They could not believe a woman was standing before them, teaching them.” But they listened to her, engaged her, and, she says assuredly, were respectful. In addition to the teaching techniques she shares with them, they are seeing that women can be educated and perform as leaders.

“They return to their villages with a different idea about women and about girls’ education. They will hopefully start change in their own communities. Slowly, slowly.”

It is a slow process, but history has shown that quick solutions imposed upon a community do not work. Change requires the investment of the male population. Recruiting and training the mullahs—the traditional teachers of the community—is a first step towards instigating a change in attitudes, especially in far away communities where women are rarely seen outside of the home.

World Vision workers, like Wahdat and Ayoubi, believe in the importance of male stakeholders. They work hard to convince them that empowering women can only strengthen their families and communities.To achieve any social change at the local level requires the concerted and deliberate inclusion of husbands and fathers, brothers and sons. Men must be willing participants in the elimination of gender disparity.

“There shouldn’t be such a gap between genders,” says Ayoubi, whose passion for his people is equaled only by the depth of his desire to see change. Addressing village elders, he dresses in a turban and shalwar kameez (the long shirt and baggy trousers commonly worn by Afghan men). In the office, he is less traditional, but he recognizes the necessity of utilizing a common language.“We have to talk with the communities, suggest and share ideas for a future where both men and women can work fully for the better of the country and our people. It used to be in our law that two women were equal to one man.

The law has changed. But culturally, it remains in our minds.

There are many misperceptions about women....We must work to change these ideas.”

MEN—STAKEHOLDERS IN CHAHGE

Standing before a room of bearded and turbaned men, religious mullahs, and teachers from the villages, Farishta Mahmoud Yawar, 28, is the only woman in the classroom. The men listen attentively as she writes multiplication tables on the board.

Farishta is a teacher trainer inWorldVision’s School Enhancement Programme. Since 2003, over 3,000 teachers in two provinces have benefited from these classes that provide lessons in improved teaching practices. Afghanistan has at least 140,000 teachers, but only 17 percent are professionally qualified (i.e., having completed grade 12). Farishta follows a teacher training curriculum, utilized in training centers across the country.What is not common is that Farishta is a woman.

THE CHALLENGE OF RURAL AREAS: CHAR TAQ

One of Ayoubi’s greatest challenges, and successes—proof that change is possible—is the girls’ school built by World Vision, deep in a ravine of the northern mountain plateau in Jawand district, in the town of Char Taq, 132 kilometers northeast of Qala-i-Naw—a rough, six-hour drive through rocky riverbeds and over mountain passes.

Girls hadn’t attended school in Char Taq since communist rule in the 1980s, when for five or six years they sat together with boys in a primary school classroom. Seventeen girls attend-

Fatima, 27, one of thousands of young women forced to quit school when the Taliban took control of Afghanistan in 1996, poses with her children. Her eldest daughter, Khalida, 9 (far right), a fifth grade student at Naswan Girls School, hopes one day to attend teachers college.

PRISM 2007

12

pgs 01-40.indd 12

6/19/07 10:28:45 PM

Najiba, 13, leads other students in a reading assignment during Dari language class at the World Vision-supported, 3,000-student Naswan Girls School in Qala-i-Naw. When her teacher is absent and a substitute is unavailable, Najiba leads the lesson.

ed the school during those years. BibiJan, 36, was among them. She is the last educated woman of Char Taq.The others, she says, fled to Iran or Pakistan during the years of war. Some community members refer to BibiJan as the “first educated woman” of Jawand. World Vision workers enlisted her to help recruit students for the new school. She was behind the drive to bring girls back to school—going house to house, speaking with women, and encouraging families to educate their daughters. She is stylish, dressed in a bright blue head scarf and a dress of forest green crushed velvet. She has never married. Her interest is the education of her people, namely the women of her community. “When the people have education, they have fewer problems. They find solutions. Life becomes better with education. It helps the society move forward.

All of life becomes better.”

BibiJan’s door-to-door visits were met with a positive response from the women of the community. But the men of Char Taq were wary. Ayoubi and World Vision Area Manager Roberto Woisky met with them several times before arriving at an agreement.

“They told us they didn’t need a school because there were no students,” says Woisky. He asked if they had no daughters.

“We have girls, yes, but they don’t need to go to school.

Girls need to stay at home.”

Woisky remembers one leader who joked about the ben-

efits of educating his daughter: “‘She will bring more money in an arranged marriage,’ he said. The men all laughed. I couldn’t laugh.”

Woisky is troubled by what he has encountered in this rural and isolated district. Commanders abducting girls, fathers selling daughters in marriage or as payment for debts. “Women are a commodity, bought and sold like cattle or sheep,” he says.

But Woisky, with Ayoubi, persisted, and after five meetings the village men agreed to the girls’ school. In the first month of classes only 37 girls attended. But after a powerful leader sent his daughter, others followed. In one year, attendance reached 200. With a staff of only two teachers, two volunteers were recruited to help carry the workload. One, an 18 year old, had no formal education; the other, only 15, had completed grade six in Qala-i-Naw. A lack of female teachers is not particular to Jawand, but prevalent throughout the country, especially in rural areas. Only 28 percent of Afghanistan’s teachers are women.

Across the country, school enrollment has skyrocketed, but resources and support capacity continue to lag behind.

For every school that is built, resources are needed for furniture, stationery, textbooks, and especially teachers.

Finding a literate woman, not to mention one who can teach, remains a problem in scattered rural areas. Especially for girls in higher grades, women instructors are a necessity. Cultural

PRISM 2007

13

pgs 01-40.indd 13

6/19/07 10:29:06 PM

women to read and write, these courses create a new cadre of instructors who will provide girls in faraway villages with at least a basic education.

norms and the extreme segregation of genders prevent a man from teaching girls over the age of 12.

The educated women of the cities and larger towns are unable to travel long distances to teach. They cannot move alone to a foreign town or village, and their families will not move away from larger centers where husbands run businesses and their children have access to high schools and universities.

Ayoubi explains that in three decades of war, few female schools existed in any Afghan villages or towns. At least 75 percent of all schools were damaged or destroyed during the war. “For 30 years, no educated females.Where to begin then?

We had to start somewhere. We built the Char Taq school and began the literacy courses.”

Women’s literacy courses are an integral part of World Vision’s School Enhancement Programme. Training grown

WOMEN’S LITERACY

Two years ago, there were no literacy classes in Jawand. “No woman had permission to leave her home,” says Sultan Ahmad, 39, an education field officer for World Vision in the Jawand district. Working with BibiJan, World Vision opened three literacy classes in Char Taq. Today 20 classes are held in the Char Taq area, with five more in villages on the mountain plateau. Each class has 25 women.

In BibiJan’s small, home-based classroom, the mud walls are painted and covered with posters that describe in word and pictures the best health and hygiene practices and landmine

Action Steps for Concerned Christians Deepen your commitment to engagement with impoverished or marginalized communities. Encourage your church, classroom, or Bible study group to support local and international initiatives that seek to fulfill the Millennium Development Goals in Afghanistan and other countries around the world. (See the Micah Challenge at www. micahchallenge.org.)

Many girls in Afghanistan cannot complete their education due to early and/or forced marriage. Girls are sold into marriage or given as payment for debts. Despite the new constitution protecting girls from early marriage, nearly 60 percent of girls are married before their 16th birthday. In rural areas, it’s closer to 11 or 12. Pray that one day girls will be able to choose the time of their own marriage and will not be denied an education.

Following decades of war, female-headed households in Afghanistan are many. Support programs that empower widows in urban and rural areas, assisting them in skills training, micro-credit enterprise and/or marketing cooperatives.

Development agencies such as CARE (care.org), Mercy Corps (mercycorps.org), and World Vision (worldvision.org) are making a difference in the lives of these Afghan women.

Gather friends for a fundraising potluck dinner. Share stories and information of Afghan girls and women and the difference that empowerment can make. (See how others are doing this at BreakingBreadForWomen.com.) Use the money to support women’s literacy classes, girls’ educational

initiatives, and other projects that promote gender equality and the empowerment of women.

A survey in northern Afghanistan showed that only five percent of primary school teachers could pass the same exams required of their students. Teacher training is especially needed. Support government and private funding initiatives that provide resources and support capacity, ensuring that schools will have competent teachers, necessary textbooks, and best hygiene practices. CARE, Oxfam (oxfam.org), and World Vision are among the development organizations assisting such education projects in Afghanistan.

Media too often focus on the security situation, with military and political actions dominating the agenda. Help mobilize public opinion by writing a letter to the editor, drawing attention to the humanitarian situation in Afghanistan, and encouraging support for the reconstruction and development process.

Pray for the many humanitarian aid workers who daily risk their lives to serve communities in need. Over 100 aid workers have been killed in Afghanistan since 2001.

Write your senators and representatives, tell them you support and encourage an increase in humanitarian assistance to Afghanistan as directed through civilian actors.

Ask that military forces (rather than delivering humanitarian aid) focus on the promotion of peace and human security through capacity building of the Afghan security sector and the proper training of the national army and police forces.

PRISM 2007

14

pgs 01-40.indd 14

6/19/07 10:29:07 PM

awareness as well. Through a large window, light floods the room, sparkling on the sequined shawls of women. “I teach them how to wash their food properly, how to care for themselves and for their children,” BibiJan says. At the same time, women are learning to read and write. Afghanistan has one of the lowest rates of literacy in the world: only one in 10 Afghan women can read.

A thin woman in the corner, wrapped in a long black veil, worn and faded, looks older than her years. Her name is Bibigul.

She says she must come to class to learn. “With education, I am able to help my children.When I can read and write, I can help them. When they have questions or homework, I can do something. When they’re little, who can help them, if I cannot?”

Research has shown that an educated woman is more likely to delay marriage and childbirth, immunize her children, and understand the nutritional needs of her family. Higher educational levels correlate with improved levels of child survival and development.With infant and child mortality rates among the highest in the world, educating women is key to any developmental efforts in Afghanistan.

BibiJan speaks to the needs of the women in her community.

She knows their average life expectancy is only 43. “We have so few schools, we’re not literate, we have no female doctors, ... we have no freedom.We want our girls to become engineers, doctors, teachers.” This class is a start.

Displaying the map of Afghanistan in her school notebook, Shafiqa Laghari, 9, says she wants to go to university and become an engineer. Her dream for her country? “Peace.

I dream of a country with no guns and no more fighting.”

mentality, very closed minds.”Tribal codes are strong in rural communities, however, and Warqa could not permit Masturah to work, traveling to villages on the plateau or even to the all-male World Vision office, without a maharam (a male chaperone from her family) as required by Afghan law and culture.

Woisky agreed that Masturah’s father, without salary, could accompany her as she works.Without him, communities in this area would not accept a woman traveling alone. Tradition forbids it. Last year, threats were made against her by a relative who didn’t believe she should be working.Through mediation, the issue was resolved, but it serves as a frightening reminder of the difficulties women face.

Despite the threats, and with her father’s support, Masturah continues to work. She hopes that her efforts will lead to a future different from the past. “I want it to be calmer, without all the fighting. Afghanistan should be a country where women are considered the equal of men.”

RECRUITING WOMEN TO RECRUIT WOMEN

There are 201 schools in Badghis Province. Only 24 are for girls. In a 2004 report, 99 percent of girls in Badghis were not enrolled in school.World Vision programming is working to change this. Hiring women who can relate to women of the community was a first step.

Masturah, 21, is an education development facilitator for World Vision in Jawand. She monitors activities at the girls’ school and in the women’s literacy program. Woisky says she has been instrumental in encouraging girls to attend school and women to join literacy classes. Masturah attributes some of her success to the incentives that are offered to students.

Men are more willing to send their daughters, wives, and sisters to school or literacy class if food rations or some commodity, such as soap or sandals, is offered. “At first, the men send them because of the food,” she says. “But I hope that when the women begin to learn, when they become educated, the men will know why it is good.”

Masturah knows many women who, given the opportunity, would love to be in her position: educated and employed.

“Many girls tell me they would like to work like me, but their fathers and brothers will not allow them,” she says. Masturah’s father,Warqa, describes the village men as “having a different

THE FUTURE WILL BE DIFFERENT...

After school, Shafiqa Laghari, 9, a classmate of Khalida’s at Naswan School in Qala-i-Naw, plays “bride and groom” with her sisters and friends. Sometimes, using old scraps of material, they make dolls to act out their dreams. While Khalida shares the dream of her mother to one day be a teacher, Shafiqa Continued on page 30.

PRISM 2007

15

pgs 01-40.indd 15

6/19/07 10:29:16 PM

ones in tunics and trousers, some wrapped in a floor-length veil.The older girls are fully covered in the blue burqa.Their soft chatter goes almost unheard amidst the sounds of donkeys braying, dogs barking, and a truck bumping through town.

The street is muddy from the spring thaw; deep, sloppy ruts mark the road. The girls step gingerly, from ridge to rock, as they make their way to class in small, ill-fitting plastic shoes or in more culture-defying high heels.

For Afghan children, the future is precarious. Change is slow and tentative. Still, advances in education, the increased enrollment of girls, teacher training courses, women’s literacy —these are a first flicker of light at the edge of a long-imposed darkness.

Masturah, the school monitor, joins the girls on the road.

She will visit their school today. Later, at the office, her colleagues speak with hope of the change that is possible. Already, they say, Masturah’s efforts have made such a difference. They say that in Jawand district more girls than ever before are going to school. “The future will be different, lives will be better,” they say. Her father, sitting silent and thoughtful, raises his eyebrows and sighs. He stares into the distance. “If the people let her... otherwise it will be finished.” ■

A New Day in Afghanistan continued from page 15. speaks of becoming an engineer. She wants to help build her country. Her uncle, Abdel Qayoum Laghari, 47, is the former director of education for the province. He worked closely with World Vision when it first started school construction in Badghis.

Laghari believes Shafiqa’s dreams of engineering could, one day, be reality, if security holds and culture bends. He refers to a provincial scholarship available for university studies in India. Four men will go this year. But, shaking his head, he says no women applied for the two allotted female slots. It’s a problem of maharam, he explains; most families cannot afford to send a male family member to accompany the woman. Still, Laghari has hope for the future. “If the security situation remains calm, if the repression of women and girls can be removed, even within 10 years, I think we’ll be ready for such change. There are people among us who want to see this.”

There are, however, stumbling blocks. “Even before the Taliban, there was a sickness in some of our districts.They don’t believe in education, but it’s not like that everywhere. ... Today the majority of Afghan people are talented and truly interested in democracy and freedom for both men and women.”

Shafiqa’s mother, Salimeh, 30, never attended formal school, but learned to read and write in her village mosque. She is the second of her husband’s three wives. Their families share a small compound with a brother-in-law and his two wives and children. Between their families there are 18 children. Salimeh worries for women who remain illiterate and locked in their homes. “Women who are literate and educated, their lives improve significantly,” she says. “They can learn new skills.

They can better care for their families. Educated women aren’t so likely to pour gasoline over their bodies and burn themselves.” She refers to the harrowing problem, reported by human rights organizations, of self-immolation by Afghan women.

Last year, 150 cases of suicide by immolation were reported in western Afghanistan. Expressionless, Salimeh says she knows of three cases in recent months in Qala-i-Naw. One was a neighbor.

“She was unhappy. Many women who do this were forced into unwanted, compulsory marriages. Others are suffering from their mother-in-law. They have no opportunities locked away in their houses. Such treatment, these are obstacles to girls’ education.”

As dawn breaks, a blue and purple haze hangs thick over the town, a typical Afghan maze of beige mudbrick houses and walled compounds. The air is heavy with smoke from wood fires heating water for tea. Soon young girls gather in the street in front of each family compound—the younger

Mary Kate MacIsaac is the communications manager for World Vision Afghanistan. A Canadian photojournalist and writer who challenges herself and others to seek solidarity with marginalized persons and communities, she has spent seven of the last 10 years working in conflict zones such as Israel/Palestine, Kosovo, and Iraq.

PRISM 2007

30

pgs 01-40.indd 30

6/19/07 10:32:47 PM

Coming Together A community’s churches take a stand against youth violence

BY KEITH WILBURN

around, hoping their presence would deter the groups of electrified youth.

It took only seconds for two of the groups to collide, and moments later the young girl raced out of the mob in a state of total panic, her face slashed and bleeding profusely. What was most shocking to Robinson, however, was the choice that this girl made in that moment of terror and desperation.

As she rounded the corner, instead of running to the police officers standing nearby or to a group of peers gathered just a few feet away, she made straight for the bright fluorescent green vest he was wearing. Although she didn’t know him, she knew that the green vest meant safety, and that once she was in his arms no harm would come to her. With her bleeding face pressed against him and his arms holding her tightly,

Even before the young girl with blood streaming down her face ran into the arms of Pastor Bryan Robinson, he and the other Safe Corridor volunteers knew that something was going to go down at the corner of Chelten and Germantown avenues. The students had just been let out of Germantown High School for the day, and as they reached the busy intersection lined with storefronts and street vendors, they began gathering in large groups of about 50 on each of the four corners. There was movement everywhere—kids running down the streets, groups talking excitedly with waving hands and pointing fingers, small arguments and shoving matches breaking out here and there. The police had been notified that a feud started earlier at the school was moving into the streets, and patrol cars and officers were positioned all

PRISM 2006

28

any doubt that might have lingered in the mind of Robinson or any of the other Safe Corridor volunteers about the importance of their countless hours of patrolling the streets quickly dispersed. The youth had not only noticed them but knew what they stood for—love and concern.

This is just one of many stories that members of the Germantown Clergy Initiative (GCI) can tell when asked about the impact the organization has had on the youth in this northwest Philadelphia neighborhood. GCI is a coalition of congregations and community leaders committed to being a transforming Christian presence in and around Germantown High School. Tired of standing on the sidelines as countless youth are lost to violence, crime, drugs, and hopelessness, its members gather together weekly for several hours to pray, discuss issues in the community facing young people, and to plan and implement programs to address these problems.

Baptist, Presbyterian, Brethren in Christ, Friends, United Methodist, Church of God in Christ, evangelical, and Catholic churches are all represented in the coalition.

The organization’s commitment to neighborhood youth grew out of a response to crisis. Following weeks of youth violence in the fall of 2004, a 14-year-old by the name of Samuel Evans was shot in the back in the business district of Germantown. This outrageous act of violence in broad daylight prompted area pastors to take action. Robinson, whose church, Circle of Hope NW, is located directly across from where the shooting took place, remembers his feelings at the time: “The violence was sitting on the doorstep. I knew what was going on in the streets of Germantown, and I didn’t do anything about it.When this happened I got angry at my lack of initiative and decided to get involved.”

Rev. LeRoi Simmons, associate minister of Canaan Baptist Church and executive director of the Central Germantown Council, was asked to coordinate a response, and after two weeks of planning, fasting, and praying, a group of 19 pastors stood in the middle of Vernon Park and watched as over 1,000 men and women from local churches gathered together for a prayer rally. On November 16, 2004, these 1,000 men and women marched down the middle of Germantown Avenue to the high school, encircled the entire school, and for the next hour prayed in unison for the students, families, teachers, administration, and the community. “Things changed following that day,” said Simmons a year later. “There have been no student shootings around the school since we prayed.”

The prayer rally wasn’t the culmination; it was just the beginning. The pastors used it as a springboard to start the Germantown Clergy Initiative. The first members of GCI committed to meeting weekly, established a bank account, created a letterhead, and became an official organization with the slogan “We will always be here.” Germantown High School

quickly became the focus of the organization’s efforts, since it was identified as a center of youth activity and the place where most of the negative issues started. According to Simmons, “The most critical need was in the high school. About 50 percent of the students drop out, 89 percent read below proficiency, and in 2004, of about 1,500 students, only 30 were on the honor roll.”To Simmons and others, giving the youth hope for their future seemed the best way to start addressing their destructive behavior.

In the 18 months since the initial meetings and prayer rally, the GCI has implemented several programs to address the needs of youth at the high school. The Safe Corridors Program promotes safety for students as they travel to and from high school in the mornings and afternoons.Volunteers from local churches are trained, given green vests and walkie-talkies, and sent out in pairs to stand at strategic locations around the high school. Their mission is to show the students that they are loved and cared for by warmly greeting them and then giving them a safe passage. If a problem arises the volunteers call local police and remain at the scene in order to be witnesses.

The volunteers have not only witnessed a decrease in violence around the school since the Safe Corridor patrols started, but they have also witnessed a softening of the students.

“When we first started Safe Corridors, we were barely tolerated by the students.We said good morning or good afternoon and were met with blank stares. Midway through the winter, however, about 10 percent of the students began to speak to us, and by the end of the school year 80 percent would respond to our greetings. It just took them a while to understand why we were there and that we weren’t going to go away.”

Police attitudes were also changed by the presence of the Safe Corridor volunteers. Dr. JoAnn Seaver, a Quaker and head of the school board at Greene Street Friends School, noticed this change during the time that she patrolled the streets around the school. “I could see that the presence of the Safe Corridor people and their relationship to the police over the months affected the attitudes of the police towards those high school kids,” she says.“They weren’t wailing on them; they were very measured and avuncular in the way they were dealing with the students.We had set the tone that these are kids we care about.”

Ensuring that the kids arrive at school safely was the first priority, but there was also a desire to know these youth and to contribute positively to their personal growth and development. GCI initiated a mentoring program that takes place weekly in the school during third period.The group of about eighty 11th and 12th graders meets with several area pastors to discuss issues and topics such as leadership development, African-American history, finances, family, career planning, and goal setting. It is a time when students are able to develop

PRISM 2006

29

relationships with positive role models and learn how to effectively work through the difficult issues they face daily. Simmons remembers an initial conversation where students were asked to share their dreams, aspirations, and goals: “When I asked one student how he was going to attain his goal, he said that he didn’t have money, but he had a knife and would take the money from someone. I did everything I could not to fall down when I heard this. This was where we had to start.” A large part of the sessions is teaching the young men and women that there are ways of dealing with their problems other than what they have been shown on the streets and in the media.

The weekly mentoring group culminated in a trip to Baltimore to visit Morgan State University, the Great Blacks in Wax Museum, and a local restaurant for dinner. The students, none of whom had ever been on a college campus, were guided by a freshman at the school who talked to them about college life, what was needed to succeed in college, and what the students needed to do in order to get accepted. Robinson remembers how intently the students listened during the presentation, “Most of the young men wanted to go to college but had no realistic models,” he says. “While sitting there they started envisioning themselves at college, and some at that particular college. During that visit the whole world was opened up to them.”

Understanding that a key part of improving a high school is parent involvement, the GCI has also been developing a support system for the parents of students in area schools.

Last June parents involved in Home and School boards from area elementary, middle, and high schools were invited to an appreciation dinner hosted by the GCI at First Presbyterian Church of Germantown. About 12 parents showed up for a catered dinner, a time of prayer, and a discussion session where they were able to express their needs and concerns. Out of that meeting came a plan to help support the parents of Germantown High School in the creation of a parents’ room.

Over the summer volunteers from the GCI worked with Hattie Staton, a lead parent from Germantown High School, to clean, paint, and furnish the new parent room, which now serves as a resource and support center for parents of students.

She has been greatly encouraged by the efforts of the GCI. “As a parent I appreciate their help,” she says. “It is wonderful that there is someone to take a stand and back up parents and their children. I’ve been calling on God, and now God is sending his people.”

Getting involved in the education of students and helping raise educational standards is the next major goal for the GCI. Their current involvement in meeting regularly with high school math and reading coaches and teachers, implementing and supporting an after-school gospel choir, funding a media room where students can learn television and radio

broadcasting skills, and providing reading materials and resources to the school are all ways that they are working to improve school morale and support effective educational practices.

Most recently, 11 members of the GCI met with Paul Vallas, superintendent of Philadelphia schools, to propose a plan asking for greater involvement of the GCI within the school. Vallas agreed to a plan that would finance the training and funding of parent monitors who would be present in the school hallways between class periods, establish monthly meetings with GCI members and school officials to strategize ways the group can continue to support the educational progress of the school, and give the GCI a voice in the discussion of major school decisions.

The efforts of the GCI have benefited not only the youth and community but also the churches and pastors involved.

For one, it has made the church a relevant presence in the life of the community once again.“Instead of doing church work, we are doing the work of the church. This has helped offset the community’s notion that the church is useless, nonexistent, and uncaring,” explains Simmons. Robinson agrees: “There are a lot of churches on corners just taking up space.Through our involvement in the community and school, we can reclaim our identity as the church in Germantown.”

It has also encouraged many of the members to see Christians from different denominations, ethnicities, genders, and ages come together to work and pray for a common cause. Dr. Seaver says, “Here is a group that can put aside doctrinal differences to walk the Christian walk.” Rev. Dr. Patricia Mitchell agrees that it is significant: “It is a wonderful example of what Christianity is. Nothing else matters but that we come together to serve others in love.”

The young girl with the slashed face is one of many youth who are glad that the churches of Germantown have been able to come together to serve in love. Robinson has seen her on the street several times since the incident, and each time they exchange a knowing smile of having shared a significant experience, a provision of God’s unconditional love in a moment of utter despair.

“Hope has been inspired in the young people, business people, school, parents,” explains Robinson excitedly. “People actually believe that, since the preachers in the neighborhood are involved, something is going to happen, something is going to change.” If you ask the young girl, or any number of the students in the area, they would probably say it already has. ■ To learn more, go to GermantownClergyInitiative.com.

A full-time Master of Divinity student at Palmer Seminary, Keith Wilburn also serves as an associate pastor at Circle of Hope N.W. in the Germantown section of Philadelphia.

PRISM 2006

30