Textbooks Discarded, Used for Packing Food After Taliban Calls Curriculum Inappropriate

Social media has been flooded with images showing Afghan school textbooks being used in burger shops across Afghanistan to wrap food ingredients. A photo published on social media shows a multitude of Afghan school textbooks stored in the corner of a burger store.

This comes even though every year many Afghan students complain of lack of books and teaching materials in Afghanistan.

Recently, a Taliban official had called the school curriculum "inappropriate”. Seyed Ahmad Shahidkhel, the Admin and Finance Deputy Minister of Education of the Taliban, had recently told TOLOnews that secondary and high schools have not been opened to female students since a revision of the curriculum by the group is underway.

According to him, soon "the science of ethics, belief, the science of raising children and marriage", will be added to the curriculum of these students.

Officials of the Ministries of Education and Higher Education of the Taliban have already expressed dissatisfaction with the Afghan educational system and the generations educated under the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan.

Previously, in 2021, Abdul Baqi Haqqani, the Acting Minister of Higher Education of the Taliban, had also said that they can’t expect much from graduates of universities under the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan.

Haqqani had stressed that the foundations of education in Afghanistan must be restructured, and students should be educated according to “the Islamic values”.

Meanwhile, the Taliban have made extensive changes in the curriculum of Afghan universities. After the takeover of Afghanistan by the group, hours of Islamic culture teaching in all departments of universities across the country have tripled.