Khost youth launch school books collection campaign

KHOST CITY (Pajhwok): To address the issue of textbooks’ shortage, a group of youth has launched a house-to-house campaign to collect books.

The youth say they launched the campaign in response to growing complaints about the shortage of textbooks in schools.

One of the youth, Naqibullah Zaland, told Pajhwok Afghan News they collected extra school books from residents and then hand them over the provincial Education Department.

He said they had so far collected over 1,500 school books from different parts of the province.

Zaland said: “The books shortage issue was felt in schools, we (the education activists) thought it would be good to walk from house to house and collect extra school books from the people and hand them over to students who need them.”

Another activist, Obaid Zhwand, told Pajhwok that they worked in coordination with local authorities to address the issue of books shortage.

He added they had collected more than 2000 books last year from the provincial capital and districts of Khost and handed them to the education department.

Zhwand said: “We try to distribute these books to students who lack them at first step and then we hand over extra books to the education department. This is our message to all families if they have extra books, they must hand them over to us.”

Khost residents praised the campaign.

A resident of Khost, Hazratullah, told Pajhwok: “This is a good action, I handed over some extra books to them, I ask other people if they have extra books in their houses, they must also give them to the activists to deliver them to students who need books.”

Provincial Education Department head Maulvi Mohammad Anwar Dinparwar told Pajhwok for the improvement of education, the youth’s campaign to collect books was commendable.

Dinparwar also recommended more coordination between relevant institutions to address the issue of scarcity of textbooks.

He said: “We welcome any kind of assistance with the education sector, all such activities must be in coordination with our department, they must hand over the collected books to us.”

He said school books shortage was an old issue, it would be solved completely next educational year.

In addition to Khost, students in several provinces have been complaining about lack of professional teachers and textbooks.

aw/ma