By Zuhra Abhar
Ms. Sakena Yacoobi, Founder & Executive Director
Afghan Institute of Learning (www.afghaninstituteoflearning.org)
Established in Peshawar, Pakistan in 1995
AIL’s top priorities are providing quality education and healthcare to all who seek it, quality training, including capacity building, leadership and human rights workshops, teacher training and health workshops, reviving the arts and culture of Afghanistan, and teaching about peace and forgiveness.
Afghan Women Leaders Connect has supported AIL’s work since 2002, when at that time the young organization was opening an office in Kabul and converting offices in Herat and Jalalabad into formal presences, no longer subject to a Taliban ban. Since then, Connect has supported a myriad of AIL’s programs for several years across Afghanistan, including teacher training, a preschool, fast track classes to mainstream older girls who had lost years of schooling under Taliban restrictions, literacy classes, health clinics and skills training programs for self-employment.
AIL was established in Peshawar, Pakistan in 1995 by Ms. Sakena Yacoobi. Undeterred by Taliban edicts, AIL began operations in Afghanistan in 1997, first in Herat, and later in Kabul and Jalalabad (1999), and Logar (2001). By 2001, AIL had served over 3,000 students in these cities through 78 home-based schools, 6 pre-schools, 6 income generation classes and a formal girls’ school.
AIL also provided health care and health education to 55,000 women and children in Jalalabad and Kabul between 1999 and 2001. In 2002, AIL opened offices in Kabul and Herat, and later that year converted its sub-offices in Herat and Jalalabad from underground to formal presences and started teacher training and human rights training in Afghanistan.
In 2002 through 2004, AIL provided education and health care services to 400,000 women and children in Afghanistan and 650,000 overall. AIL’s top priorities are quality teacher training (over 9,000 Afghan women have been trained to date) and ‘fast track’ classes designed to provide education to older girls who lost years of formal education under the Taliban.
Video about AIL and Ms. Sakena Yacoobi:
AIL has directly touched the lives of over 10 million and has indirectly affected over 50 million Afghans. AIL has been working in the following provinces: Herat, Kabul, Balkh, Parwan, Nangahar, Logar, Ghazni, Bamyan, Wardak, Kapisa and Nuristan as well as in Peshawar, Pakistan.
AIL’s current annual budget is $1.4 million. In addition, AIL receives approximately $300,000 in support from the communities it works with and in-kind contributions. This support often takes the form of buildings to house the learning centers, salaries for staff, materials and supplies as well as security for the centers. AIL currently has a staff of 450 Afghans.
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