Targeted for Violence, Schools Still Making Strides in Afghanistan

After a strong start, work on rebuilding Afghanistan’s school system has been challenged over the past two years by insurgents who have made schools one of their primary targets.

Several positive changes have helped reshape the country’s education landscape since 2001, when U.S.-led forces went to war in Afghanistan to topple the Taliban, and world attention focused on a country where years of war, famine, and the extremist Islamic regime had crippled schools.

Today, more girls than ever before are attending school, and hundreds of new schools have opened doors, boosted by the international aid...