Sakena Yacoobi « Skoll Foundation

Afghan Institute of Learning

Skoll Entrepreneur(s): Sakena Yacoobi
Change(s) Addressed: Economic & Social Equity, Peace & Security, Tolerance & Human Rights

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DESCRIPTION:

Born in Herat, Afghanistan, Sakena Yacoobi came to the United States in the 1970s to earn her bachelor’s and master’s degrees in public health. In the 1980s, she worked as a health consultant at D’Etre University in Michigan. From 1992 to 1995, she worked for the International Rescue Committee in Pakistan, increasing the number of Afghan refugee girls enrolled in IRC-supported schools from 3,000 to 15,000. During that time, she also served on the Agency Coordinating Body for Afghan Relief delegation of the United Nations, as well as on the United Nations Rehabilitation Plan for Afghanistan. During the mid-1990s, funding for education and health programs in Afghanistan was cut dramatically as a result of the Taliban’s grip on power. Sakena was determined to keep education and health programs going, despite the Taliban’s opposition, and thus she founded the Afghan Institute of Learning (AIL) in 1995.

KEY ACCOMPLISHMENTS AS OF 2010

Since its inception in 1996, AIL’s model of community-based support, with 316 Educational Learning Centers providing education to 235,000 Afghan women and children, has been replicated by others across Afghanistan, reaching populations with no prior access to education.
AIL’s teacher-training curriculum, which includes interactive learning and critical thinking skills, has created a new basis for a society that values human rights, personal responsibility and leadership. AIL has trained 16,400 teachers, reaching nearly 3,470,000 students.
Having impacted the lives of more than 7 million Afghans through education, teacher training, and workshops on human rights, women’s rights, peace, and leadership, AIL has helped Afghans to move to the next level of self-reliance. Ninety-five percent of the participants in leadership workshops have demonstrated leadership in their communities, something unheard of in the past.

SEE THEIR WORK IN ACTION:

The woman issue in Afghanistan has been very bad for many, many years.

Living under the Taliban, it was a time that I don't think any human being wants to be under that kind of condition.

Specifically women, who are their victims.

They were not able to go to school. They were not able to go to work. Even they were not allowed to see a doctor.

During the war in Afghanistan, we lost nurses, we lost doctors, we lost educated society. So, during this time you could imagine what happened to Afghanistan.

Now, people are so devastated, they need somebody to just teach them hygiene, teach them how to take care of a flu or a cold, or something very simple.

I am Sakena Yacoobi. I am the chief executive director Afgan Institute of Learning. Our objective is the education for the people of Afghanistan, specifically children and women.

People are just starting on their education. Definitely we are lacking teacher. Now we have about five million children going to school, and we are... out of 60,000 teachers and you can imagine that this is not enough. Afghan Institute of learning, is a non-profitable organization, and mainly run by women.

We run program in area of education, health, leadership, woman's rights, woman's right, gender issue, management and peace education.

So far, AIL has drained 16,000 teachers, and we have reached 6.8 million people.
We train the teacher, not only to be just a teacher, but lead the children, make the other an part of the society, a direction that they can take for themselves.
They can ask question. They can understand what's their right and how they can request this needs from the government.

So AIL is trying to teach nurse midwife program.

Maternal mortality rates is one of the second highest in the world in Afghanistan. Every five child, will lose one child, and you can imagine how horrible is it.

The ministry of education and the ministry of health are really working with us. And we are training people right and left
Again security is such a big issue right now in Afghanistan. Unfortunately there are places that we could not go, and the Taliban are coming back.

It was very hard, because I knew that if something happened I will never forgive myself, because the life of all these women, all these girls is going to be in our hand.

So we made the decision that, yes, we close the center.
Life is a tragedy everyday. Life is a challenge for us.

We know that. And it is something that we have lived with it for thirty-five years.

We hired this man to run one of our other centers. But he's hoping that his center reopens. People are suffering, woman are victim. But they will go continuously. And you could see that how faithfully they are really believing in the education, because they were not during the Taliban working and now they are working instead .

They are not sort of sitting in a corner and saying, what?
That security is not there, what should I do?

Every year, we graduate from all of our programs about an average of 20,000 students.

So in total we provide service for 350,000 women and children annually. So it means that we have a long way to go but, it's wonderful to see the impact.

The future is bright because the people have this strength in them that they really want to be independent.

They want to be self sufficient.

Believe me.

The people of Afghanistan has the potential; has the to overcome.

And to that I see a beautiful, very bright future for the people of Afghanistan, and for the new generation of Afghanistan.

That would be my dream come true.

Sakena Yacoobi