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Yemeni Women Get a Chance to Learn Through Literacy Project
FrontLines - March 2010
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Three girls learn to read and write in the Al-Shukani School’s literacy class, Wadi District, Marib
Governorate, May 2009.
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MARIB, Yemen—Anisa
Mohammad did not have the
opportunity to attend formal
school as a child. Instead, she
was required to stay at home to
do the housework, and her
father married her off at age
10. Now, at 23, she is the
mother of four and is pregnant
with her fifth child.
“Ever since I was a child I
loved school very much, but
never had the chance to go to
school like other children. I
feel like I’ve missed a lot,”
said Mohammad.
Mohammad was the first to
register when she heard about
a literacy class at Al-Dorrah
School in the Marib
Governorate that is supported by
USAID. Despite her responsibilities
at home, she managed to
complete a year of intensive
training, including afternoon
adult literacy classes, and can
now read and write with ease.
Yemen continues to rank last
among 134 countries for women’s
progress in the economy,
education, health, and politics,
according to the World Economic
Forum’s 2009 Global
Gender Gap report. While
Yemen has made progress in the
past 10 years toward meeting
the Millennium Development
Goal that calls for improved literacy
rates for men and women
aged 15 to 24, only 30 percent
of Yemeni women are literate,
compared with 70 percent
of men.
The plight of women and
girls in Yemen is inextricably
linked to poverty in a country
where 45 percent of the population
lives on less than $2 per
day. Women who receive an
education are much more
likely to ensure that their children
are educated, helping to
break the poverty chain.
This is exactly what is happening
in Mohammad’s case:
“I am proud to say that I now
personally teach my two kids
who are in the first and second
grade. I make sure that my children go to school daily. I follow their lessons very closely. I also encourage my neighbors to send their children to school.”
Rifa’ah Ayed, 45, walks a full hour to reach afternoon adult literacy classes at Al-Sahari School, another school in Marib that is supported by USAID’s Basic Education Support and Training (BEST) Project.
In Majzer alone, the project helped 227 women in six adult literacy classes. “Adult literacy classes not only helped us read and write, but have also helped boost our self-esteem and enabled us to express our self-confidence,” said Ayed.
In the Al-Wadi District of Marib, the project is reaching out to a marginalized group known as the Akhdam, meaning “servants” in Arabic. Members of this group often are subject to harassment if they try to get an education and usually are sent to work at an early age as street sweepers or in the gardens or houses of the wealthy.
To encourage women from this group to join literacy classes, the
BEST Project worked with imams of a local mosque to conduct an awareness campaign. In each district, 20 teenage girls and young women signed up to participate in the six-month literacy class.
“I feel lucky to have joined the literacy class; it is an opportunity that has never been available for me,” said 16-year-old Naseem Mohammad (no relation to Anisa Mohammad). “Thanks to our facilitator Kareema, who has been very patient and has been treating us with respect, and thanks to the USAID BEST Project [which] has helped open the literacy class for us.”
In addition to adult literacy classes, the BEST Project supports efforts to improve education for girls and women by: training teachers; building walls around schools and providing separate latrines for women to address privacy concerns among girls and their families; and creating mothers and fathers councils to encourage community engagement in schools.
Staff from USAID’s office in Yemen contributed to this article.
★
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