VOLUME 64 - Jul 2011
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VOLUME 64 - Jul 2011 Women’s Rights in AfghAnistAn * Thank you to Translators Without WHAT’S NEW: Borders for qualifying CW4WAfghan as an * Project Director Lauryn Oates and INGO able to have materials translated at no cost. TWB volunteers from around the world are Executive Director, Janice Eisenhauer travelled now working on translations for our new French to Afghanistan for three weeks in January 2011 website and for a new online resource soon to be visiting the CW4WAfghan funded schools and launched in Dari, Pashto and English. literacy classes as well as working closely with the CW4WAfghan Kabul Office staff (see page 12) * The CW4WAfghan Fund Development Committee members have worked hard * Nine of the CW4WAfghan Board of over the past months to develop specific Directors and Executive met together in responsibilities and timelines to research a Calgary in April for a 2 1/2 day board retreat. number of potential funding sources. Members The meeting included finalizing the update of are applying for grants from local and our Strategic Plan, led by Madeliene Tarasick, international sources to assist with sustaining President and Marg Stewart, Treasurer. our projects and matching individual donor dollars. * Afghan MP, Fawzia Koofi toured Canada in June to release her new book Letters to my * Planning for the upcoming Daughters (Douglas & McIntyre). Members annual Symposium and AGM for attended a number of events hosted by 2011 Champions: Education for CW4WAfghan and affiliated members (see page 8) Afghan Women and Girls, is well underway for Oakville, Ontario, * Funding has been committed by CIDA from September 29th to October for our new two-year teacher-training project 1st (see page 10, 13 & 14) called FANOOS / Safe Light. This project will REGISTER NOW. be managed by our Kabul Office staff and our Tickets are going fast! partner organization, the Afghan Women’s Resource Centre. VICTORIA Breaking Bread Breaking Bread co-hosted by St. Aidan’s United Come and enjoy a potluck Fundraiser dinner Church and Victoria Chapter - A very successful At St. Aidan’s Church evening including raising $3,500 for education projects in Afghanistan! Bring a potluck dish and a donation to support Education for Afghan Women and Girls WHEN: Wednesday, April 6 at 6:00 pm WHERE: St. Aidan's United Church 3703 St. Aidan's Street (Richmond & Cedar Hill X Road) Guest Speaker: LAURYN OATES recently returned from Afghanistan Manager of the Excel-erate Teacher Training Program and Projects Director for Canadian Women For Women in Afghanistan For more information call - 250-727-9891 or 250-477-8515 (tax receipts will be issued for donations of $30 or more) Co - hosted by St. Aidan’s United Church and CW4WAfghan Victoria CONGRATULATIONS on another very successful Breaking Bread Dinner fund-raising event in ** SASKATOON ** THANK YOU: SIAST Hotel and Restaurant Administration Year 2 students and all the supporters of the new chapter in Saskatchewan! 2 Breaking Bread at SIAST - SASKATCHEWAN On Wednesday, March 16, 2011, the newly formed Saskatchewan chapter of Canadian Women for Women in Afghanistan (CW4WAfghan) played host to 100 guests for an evening of wonderful Afghan food, a silent auction, and a presentation by CW4WAfghan founding member and Executive Director, Janice Eisenhauer. The event was held in the Kelsey Dining Room at SIAST in Saskatoon, SK. The evening started off with cocktails while guests mingled and checked out the various silent auction items, purchased CW4WAfghan memberships, and shopped for various Afghan items and books. The ambiance and atmosphere of the room was fabulous – enhanced by details such as cloth tablecloths and napkins, candles, lovely place settings, tulips, Afghan background music, and stunning photos of Afghanistan displayed on the large screen. The visual highlight of the room was undoubtedly the beautiful ice sculpture with special lighting. The SIAST Hotel and Restaurant Administration Year 2 students did a fabulous job decorating the room, and more importantly, preparing and serving the food. Under the expert guidance of their instructors, they prepared a delicious four course Afghan meal and they served it in a professional and elegant manner. Guests were treated to an amazing meal at a price that was equally amazing. Ticket prices were only $50 and of that amount, $30 was a donation to CW4WAfghan. After a fabulous dinner, guests had the pleasure of hearing Janice Eisenhauer speak about CW4WAfghan. Janice spoke about the important education projects in Afghanistan and showed photos of her very recent trip to Kabul and Bamiyan City in Afghanistan. Many of the guests at the dinner had attended previous Breaking Bread dinners at SIAST and other guests were attending for the first time. All were appreciative of the opportunity to meet Janice and to hear her speak about CW4WAfghan’s history, mandate and projects in Afghanistan. Grace Carney and Laurel Marsh have hosted four previous Breaking Bread dinners at SIAST with the support of the Food Services Department at Kelsey. This year, Grace and Laurel joined forces with Rita Priestley and Sharon Odegard, the president and vice- president of the new Saskatchewan CW4WAfghan chapter, respectively, in order to plan a larger Breaking Bread dinner. It was a very successful evening by all accounts and to top off the evening, an anonymous (and very generous!) member of CW4WAfghan in Saskatchewan donated funds to match the fund-raising efforts that evening. Organizers are thrilled to report that a total of more than $10,000 was raised for CW4WAfghan education projects. Organizers are very appreciative of the support from the SIAST community and would like to extend L-R: Sharon Odegard, Rita Priestley, Janice Eisenhauer, Laurel Marsh, Grace Carney a huge thank you to everyone who attended the event. 3 Kabul Radio Broadcast Organized by CW4WAfghan Kabul Office for Global Week of Action for Education Celebration of Global Week of Action for Education May 2-8, 2011 Kabul. Every year, the Global Campaign for Education organizes Government of Afghanistan to draw the attention of a Global Action Week to draw attention to the millions the Afghan Government, the international community of children, youth and adults who cannot realize their and civil society to take firm action for equal and basic human right to access a quality education. quality education for Afghan children, youth and adults. The 2011 Global Action Week focussed on raising “To improve the standard of education available to awareness of the Afghan children, we must begin plight of millions of to openly discuss the significant girls and women from challenges we’re facing, from teacher underdeveloped and education to the security of schools developing countries who to the absence of basic learning do not have access to materials like science labs and books,” quality education. says Abdul Sattar Bahaduri, one of Canadian Women for CW4WAfghan’s Master Trainers, “and Women in Afghanistan from there, start talking about solutions (CW4WAfghan) works we can undertake.” actively in the education This roundtable not only sector to strengthen outlined the serious challenges and advance education, facing the education sector but especially for women and also suggested recommendations girls, in partnership with for the enhancement of quality Afghans. education, to improve the equal access of girls and CW4WAfghan Kabul organized a roundtable boys to quality education and shared many lessons discussion with the participation of its Master Teacher learned. This programme was broadcast on Tuesday, Trainers and one of the Education Directors from the May 3, 2011 through Radio Amuzgar. The annual KINGSTON GALA, on May 5, 2011, featured Lauryn Oates, CW4WAfghan Projects Director, as the guest speaker as well as remarks from Janice Eisenhauer, CW4WAfghan Exectutive Director. The evening included lovely food and refreshments as well as a beautifully displayed silent auction with unique donated items including home made food, artwork, jewelry, hand-crafted bird houses, and even a Don Cherry jacket, shirt and tie! The event yielded net proceeds of $16,000. To top things off, a very generous anonymous donor from Saskatoon matched over $9,000 of the funds raised by the Kingston community, to bring the net gala proceeds up to $25,000. This brings the total proceeds since the inception of the Kingston chapter in 2003 to some $130,000! Congratulations to all in Kingston for another very successful event! 4 PEOPLE ASK US… Tell us more about the teachers who are taking the training with your programme... Name: Sabrina Age: 20 I am on Day 17 of my training, in the third week. I teach math at the girls’ high school here. I learned a lot in this training, like trigonometry. I didn’t know how to solve these math problems before and now I can teach these concepts to my students. I had taken a 13-day training from the Ministry of Education on methodology after I had been teaching for one year. We were not given any training material. I did not even have the curriculum. I had a copy of the math textbook so I used that to teach. We were supposed to prepare our own lesson plans. So I had not taken any subject training before. I completed grade 12 and then I started teaching. I teach 7th grade. Before I was trained, I used to ask the other teachers how to teach, how to prepare a lesson plan, but now I can do these things myself. Because I am from this village, I knew there was a shortage of teachers, so I wanted to share what I had learned and studied with others from my village. Though I am from this place, now I live in Kabul with my parents and I commute here every day, it takes me three hours to get here. I take a taxi van, which is sponsored by a local businessman who is wanting to support education in this area, so he pays for our transportation costs so teachers from the city will come to this district.