The Peter M Goodrich Foundation

Building a library in Afghanistan to create an improved learning environment 

How can you help?

INTO Giving is supporting 1,300 Afghani schoolchildren with £21,000 (US $27,000) of grants toward opening and operating a school library.

In the COVID-19 pandemic, INTO Giving is providing £1,000 (US $1,300) in emergency relief.

The new library – opened in 2018, the only school library in Bamyan Province – is in partnership with the Peter M Goodrich Foundation, a US-based non-profit organisation created after Peter's death on September 11, 2001.

Peter died when flight 175 hit the World Trade Center. His mother started the charity in his name, as a peaceful response to the tragedy.

INTO Giving’s grants provided the Haider Abad School Library with desks, shelves, furniture, computers, books and the librarian's training and salary. Library books cover a wide array of subjects, including science, history, literature, poetry, politics and English.

Why it's important

It’s a stand for gender equality.

44% of the 1,300 schoolchildren who use the library are girls. Under the Taliban, only an estimated 1 million children – the vast majority of them boys – were permitted to attend school.  Women and girls were almost universally excluded.

The Haider Abad School Library changes that, shifts things in a new and better direction. And, given the oppression of women under the Taliban, it’s important, too, that the library itself is run by a woman, a single mother whose husband abandoned her after she gave birth to a disabled child.

 The Good News

Today, due to the efforts of international donors and the Afghan government, more than 9.2 million children are enrolled in a school of which 39% are girls. The Bamyan Province is home to the region's only university, offering young people an opportunity for progression after school.

Where is this project?

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