She bows her head sadly, likening it to a candle that lights up the dark and rugged road, but the wind was stronger than it and extinguished it, or perhaps like someone who is building a tower of beautiful dreams and wishes, and in the blink of an eye, it falls on the heads of its inhabitants.
This is how Fatima Banatish (25 years old) described her feeling after the Education Office in Hadramaut Governorate (east of the country) closed the evening complex in which she enrolled in order to continue her educational journey with her sister Asmaa after being away from education for years for personal reasons.
Fatima tells “Khuyut”: "After years of interruption from public education, the importance of evening complexes has emerged for people like us whose social and family circumstances have hindered the progress of their education. So, I joined the Al-Shehr Evening Complex and continued my educational journey until the second grade of the secondary school, accompanied by a number of my female classmates who are similar to me in age and family circumstances (housewives), but the administration closed the class, and we all returned from where we came from.
Further, she stresses that the decision to close the academic level in the complex this year frustrated her determination to complete her studies, and that when she tried to enroll in the public schools, she found a lot of bullying and harassment from her classmates, which prompted her to leave school after one month, with tears filling her eyes.
She adds, "We still cling to the hope that the candle of the evening complexes, from which women in Hadramaut have greatly benefited over the past years, will remain lit and not go out. Every day, we all—the girls of the class—wait for them to tell us, “Come back to the complex. We reopened the classroom again.”
Experience of Evening Complexes
The Ministry of Education in Hadramaut implemented this unique experience of evening education complexes in Yemen in 2015, targeting women in the governorate, employees in the state facilities who seek to improve their qualifications and living income, expatriates, displaced people, and those whose circumstances prevented them from completing their educational path.
“The experience of the evening educational complexes that Hadhramaut is distinguished by, unlike the rest of the governorates of the Republic, represented a glimmer of hope for many of those who were affected by life’s circumstances (men and women), not only for those who had left school for many years but also for the displaced and those affected by the war.”
The students of the complexes, which numbered about 18 complexes in the districts of "Ghail Bawazir, Al-Shihr, Al-Deis Al-Sharqiya, Al-Rayda, Qusayaer, Broum, and Hajar, in addition to Fuwa and Rawkab", achieved great successes, including the competition of the Republic's top students for the public schools. So, through their intense desire, they achieved the successes they sought, according to Nadia Anwar Khurida, a student at one of the evening complexes who achieved first place at the governorate level for the general secondary certificate in 2019.
She adds in her interview with "Khuyut": "After I have been out of education for more than twenty years, the experience of evening complexes was a unique experience for me. I enrolled in this education and got first place; likewise, at the university, I ranked first in the Department of Business Administration with a score of 98%, thanks to giving students the opportunity to complete their education.”
Hence, Nadia expresses her regret after the decision to close some of the classes in the evening complexes, pointing out that students, especially women, cannot go to public schools because they are busy with household responsibilities in the morning. In addition, most of the students in the complexes have dropped out of education for many years, and it is difficult for them to cope with public school students.
Limited Number of Students
The director of Al-Shehr Evening Complex for Girls, Ejlal Al-Marfadi, says that the students of the evening complexes have proven to society and to themselves their ability to overcome difficulties and have achieved great successes. Some of them have become prominent in their surroundings and have obtained university degrees. Therefore, it is sad that education is stopped and the complexes are closed.
Al-Marfadi confirms in her interview with "Khuyut" that "about 8 evening complexes in Al-Shehr have been closed; the boys' complex has been completely closed, while the girls' complex remained open, but only for the third secondary grade, with its two sections (scientific and literary)."
She adds, "I had female students who have enrolled in the complex and have studied from the seventh grade, and now they have reached high school. Consequently, the decision to close the complexes for a number of classes this year was shocking and frustrating for them.
In this regard, the new education leadership said that the number of female students is small, as it stipulated that the number of students in the one class should not be less than 15, which differed in the Al-Shehr complex, which did not meet the required number, unlike the rest of the districts. Here, I must point out that the Education Office closed the registration period before completing the number, despite our request to extend the period, and more clearly; the evening complexes have their own circumstances, and it is impossible for them to match the number of public schools for education," according to Al-Marfadi.
Official Evaluation
For his part, the Director of the Office of the Ministry of Education in Hadhramout, Amin Baabad, explains to “Khuyut” that the evaluation and reform of the evening complexes took place in a workshop attended by this year's education directors. The workshop concluded with the development of a new mechanism for the conduct of the study and the idea that there should be a specific number of students in each class.
He continues: "There are complexes that contain 8 or 5 students per class, and in return, there are 20 teachers to teach them; in addition to the administrative staff, it is difficult. Therefore, the Education Division directed to close some of them and to benefit from male and female teachers for the regular morning study, which is the origin of the education system in light of the current circumstances, and what we suffer from the shortage of teachers and the retirement of a large number of them.”
Further, the currently operating complexes are only those that are functioning well according to the mechanisms and standards developed by specialists. In addition, it is possible to open a complex in any directorate, but it must first be subject to the extent of its compatibility with the required standards, the most important of which is the number.
Degradation of Education System
The experience of the evening educational complexes that Hadhramaut is distinguished by, unlike the rest of the governorates of the Republic, represented a glimmer of hope for many of those who were affected by life’s circumstances (men and women), not only for those who had left school for many years but also for the displaced and those affected by the war, whose numbers exceeded millions. In this respect, a report issued by UNICEF confirms that nearly 6 million Yemeni students were affected by the educational disruptions during the conflict, which will have enormous consequences in the long term.
The report confirms in a statistic that there are about two million children out of the educational process, and at the same time, the girls who have dropped out of school are exposed to early marriage, and boys who have dropped out of school also become fuel for war after being recruited by the parties to the conflict into the process of "forced recruitment".
The hope to return to the classrooms will remain hanging in the hearts of students, hoping that the establishment and implementation of evening educational complexes will be re-disseminated throughout the governorates; being the positive experience and the fruitful tree that society will reap the fruits of.
