Fereshteh Forough (born 1985 [1] ) is an Afghan social activist and the CEO and founder of Code to Inspire (CTI), the first coding school for girls in Afghanistan. She is an advocate for gender equality and the empowerment of women in developing countries through digital literacy, education, and financial independence.
Forough was born in Iran to Afghan parents and grew up a refugee. [2] [3] She is one of eight siblings. [4] A year after the fall of the Taliban in 2001, her family moved back to Herat, Afghanistan. [2] [3] [5] In 2012, she moved to New York City. She currently resides in New Hampshire, United States. [6]
Forough graduated from high school in Iran, majoring in literature. She initially had no interest in computer science but was assigned the field after taking a college entrance exam. Her father encouraged her to pursue the field, and she took his advice. [5] She went on to obtain a Bachelor's in Computer Science from Herat University and later a Master's degree from Technical University of Berlin in Germany. [7]
After obtaining her master's degree, Forough became a professor of computer science at her alma mater, Herat University, where she worked for almost three years. [7] Before founding Code to Inspire in January 2015, Forough was also a co-founder and board member of Women's Annex Foundation. [8] Now known as Digital Citizen Fund, this organization is a non-profit that teaches girls and women digital literacy and works to provide access to technology and the internet to girls in developing countries. [2] [9]
Code to Inspire (CTI) opened the first all-female coding school in Afghanistan in November 2015. CTI, based in Herat, is a non-profit, one-year program. Women and girls in the program are typically between 15 and 25 years of age. Forough saw a need for an exclusively female coding school when she herself was studying and faced discrimination from male peers. [2] She set up a crowdfunding campaign through IndieGoGo and raised over $22,000 USD to help fund the coding school. [10] CTI also received funding from other organizations, such as the Malala Fund and GitHub, as well as 20 laptop computers from Overstock.com. [7] [11] Forough's goal in establishing CTI was to allow girls to learn valuable technological skills in a safe and comfortable environment. Students are also able to build their resumes which can lead to greater job opportunities after graduation. [12] More advanced students learn how to create mobile apps and educational games, while those less experienced learn the basics of coding and other technological skills, such as how to use social media. [3] Forough has voiced her desire to open new branches of CTI in other cities in Afghanistan and countries throughout the Middle East and Africa. [7] [13] [14]
In 2021, Forough was forced to close the school's physical location in Herat due to the Taliban's takeover of the country. To ensure classes were able to continue virtually, CTI provided laptops and internet packages to students in need. Eighty percent of students have continued to attend the school online. [4]
In 2016, CTI was the recipient of University of California, Berkeley CITRIS Athena Awards for Women in Technology Next Generation Engagement Award. [15] The same year, CTI was awarded Google's RISE Award which granted the organization $25,000 USD. [16] In 2017, CTI was recognized with Sustania's Community Award. [17]
Forough is a Peace is Loud speaker whose speaking topics include "Women and Technology: Investing in the Future," "Educating, Inspiring, and Empowering Afghan Women," "Coding for Social Change," and "Filling the Gender Gap in STEM." [18] She gave a TED Talk in 2013 and was a 2015 Clinton Global Initiative panel speaker. [1] [19] [20] She was also a mentor for Google's 2016 project Change is Made with Code. [5] [21] [22]
At Marie Clair's first ever Young Women's Honors in 2016, Forough won The Revolutionary award. [23] She was also recognized at The Game Awards 2019 as a Global Gaming Citizen, someone who uses games to create positive change. [24] She has been featured in the books 200 Women: Who Will Change the Way You See the World (2017), Unlocked: How Empowered Women Empower Women (2021), and We Are Still Here: Afghan Women on Courage, Freedom, and the Fight to be Heard (2022). [25] [26] [27]
Afghanistan, officially the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, is a landlocked country located at the crossroads of Central Asia and South Asia. Referred to as the Heart of Asia, it is bordered by Pakistan to the east and south, Iran to the west, Turkmenistan to the northwest, Uzbekistan to the north, Tajikistan to the northeast, and China to the northeast and east. Occupying 652,864 square kilometers (252,072 sq mi) of land, the country is predominantly mountainous with plains in the north and the southwest, which are separated by the Hindu Kush mountain range. Kabul is the country's largest city and serves as its capital. According to the World Population review, as of 2023, Afghanistan's population is 43 million. The National Statistics Information Authority of Afghanistan estimated the population to be 32.9 million as of 2020.
The treatment of women by the Taliban refers to actions and policies by two distinct Taliban regimes in Afghanistan which are either specific or highly commented upon, mostly due to discrimination, since they first took control in 1996. During their first rule of Afghanistan, the Taliban were notorious internationally for their misogyny and violence against women. In 1996, women were mandated to wear the burqa at all times in public. In a systematic segregation sometimes referred to as gender apartheid, women were not allowed to work, nor were they allowed to be educated after the age of eight. Women seeking an education were forced to attend underground schools, where they and their teachers risked execution if caught. They were not allowed to be treated by male doctors unless accompanied by a male chaperone, which led to illnesses remaining untreated. They faced public flogging and execution for violations of the Taliban's laws.
The history of the Jews in Afghanistan goes back at least 2,500 years. Ancient Iranian tradition suggests that Jews settled in Balkh, an erstwhile Zoroastrian and Buddhist stronghold, shortly after the collapse of the Kingdom of Judah in 587 BCE. In more recent times, the community has been reduced to complete extinction due to emigration, primarily to Israel. At the time of the large-scale 2021 Taliban offensive, only two Jews were still residing in the country: Zablon Simintov and his distant cousin Tova Moradi. When the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan was re-established by the Taliban in August 2021, both Simintov and Moradi made aliyah on 7 September 2021 and 29 October 2021, respectively, leaving Afghanistan completely empty of Jews. Today, the overwhelming majority of the Afghan Jewish community resides in Israel, with a small group of a few hundred living in the United States and the United Kingdom.
Dr. Habiba Sarābi is a hematologist, politician, and reformer of the reconstruction of Afghanistan after the Taliban first took power. In 2005, she was appointed as Governor of Bamyan Province - the first Afghan woman to become a provincial governor. She had served as Afghanistan's Minister of Women's Affairs and as Minister of Culture and Education. Sarabi was instrumental in promoting women's rights and representation and environmental issues. She belongs to the ethnic Hazara people of Afghanistan. Her last name is sometimes spelled Sarobi.
Nadia Anjuman was a poet from Afghanistan.
Education in Afghanistan includes K–12 and higher education, which is under the Ministry of Education and Ministry of Higher Education. In 2021, there were nearly 10 million students and 220,000 teachers in Afghanistan. The nation still requires more schools and teachers. Soon after the Taliban take took the country in August 2021, they banned girls from secondary education. Some provinces still allow secondary education for girls despite the ban. In December 2022, the Taliban government also prohibited university education for females in Afghanistan, sparking protests and international condemnation. In December 2023, investigations were being held by the United Nations into the claim that Afghan girls of all ages were allowed to study at religious schools.
Sakena Yacoobi is an Afghani activist known for her work for promoting access to education for women and children. She is the founder and executive director of the women-led NGO Afghan Institute of Learning. For her work, Yacoobi has received international recognition, including the 2013 Opus Prize, the 2015 WISE Prize, the 2016 Harold W. McGraw Prize in Education, and an honorary degree from Princeton University.
Women's rights in Afghanistan have oscillated back and forth depending on the time period as well as the regime in power. After King Amanullah Khan's attempts to modernize the country in the 1920s, women officially gained equality under the 1964 Constitution. However, these rights were taken away in the 1990s through different temporary rulers such as the mujahideen and the Taliban during the Afghan civil war. During the first Taliban regime (1996–2001), women had very little to no freedom, specifically in terms of civil liberties. When the Taliban was overthrown by the United States following the September 11 attacks, women's rights gradually improved under the presidential Islamic Republic of Afghanistan. Women were de jure equal to men under the 2004 Constitution.
Maria Bashir is a prosecutor based in Afghanistan and the only woman to ever hold such a position in the country as of 2009. With more than fifteen years of experience with Afghan civil service - the Taliban, corrupt policemen, death threats, failed assassination attempts - she has seen them all. She was banned from working during the Taliban period, when she spent her time schooling girls illegally at her residence, when it was illegal for women to be seen unescorted by men on the streets. In the post-Taliban era, she was called back into service, and was made the Chief Prosecutor General of Herat Province in 2006. With her main focus on eradicating corruption and oppression of women, she handled around 87 cases in 2010 alone.
Malala Yousafzai is a Pakistani female education activist and the 2014 Nobel Peace Prize laureate at the age of 17. She is the youngest Nobel Prize laureate in history, the second Pakistani and the only Pashtun to receive a Nobel Prize. Yousafzai is a human rights advocate for the education of women and children in her native homeland, Swat, where the Pakistani Taliban had at times banned girls from attending school. Her advocacy has grown into an international movement, and according to former Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi, she has become Pakistan's "most prominent citizen."
Roya Mahboob is an Afghan businesswoman. She founded and is CEO of the Afghan Citadel Software Company, a full-service software development company based in Herat, Afghanistan. She has received attention for being among the first IT female CEOs in Afghanistan, where it is still relatively rare for women to work outside the home. On 18 April 2013, Mahboob was named to TIME magazine's 100 Most Influential People in the World for 2013 for her work in building internet classrooms in high schools in Afghanistan and for Women's Annex, a multilingual blog and video site hosted by Film Annex. This was the 10th anniversary of the TIME special edition. The Women's Annex platform give the women of Afghanistan and Central Asia a platform to tell their stories to the world. The TIME magazine introduction to Mahboob was written by Sheryl Sandberg who is the chief operating officer of Facebook and the author of "Lean In: Women, Work and the Will to Lead". U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry met with Mahboob and other Afghan women entrepreneurs at the International Center for Women's Economic Development at the American University of Afghanistan. She is also known for her work with online film distribution platform and Web Television Network Film Annex on the Afghan Development Project. She is an advisor at the Forbes School of Business & Technology.
Sima Wali was one of the foremost Afghan human rights advocates in the world, serving as an international campaigner for the liberties and empowerment of refugee and internally displaced populations. She was the Chief Executive Officer of Refugee Women in Development (RefWID), Inc., a global non-profit organization that advocated for the civil rights of refugee women and girls fleeing from conflict and for their equitable reintegration into their societies. She was also the vice president of the Sisterhood Is Global Institute, the world’s first feminist think tank.
Shamila Kohestani is an Afghan footballer, and the former captain of the Afghanistan women's national football team. She attended boarding school in the United States at Blair Academy in Blairstown, New Jersey. In 2007, she scored six goals at the women's team's first tournament. In 2006, she won the Arthur Ashe Courage Award.
Alka Sadat (Persian: الکا سادات, is an Afghan documentary and feature film producer, director and cameraman. She became famous with her first 25-minute film Half Value Life, which highlights social injustice and crime; the film won several awards. She is the younger sister of Roya Sadat, the first Afghan woman film producer and director. The two sisters have collaborated in many film productions from 2004 and were instrumental in establishing the Roya Film House. For her first film she received the Afghan Peace Prize and since then has made many documentaries for which she has won many international awards as a producer, cameraman, and director and also for her work in Television. Both had participated in the "Muslim World: A Short-Film Festival", organized at the Los Angeles Film School, where 32 films from Afghanistan were featured. In 2013, she coordinated in holding the first Afghanistan International Women's Film Festival. Her contribution to film making so far is in 15 documentaries and one short fiction feature film.
Khalida Popal is an Afghan football player. Popal is the founder and director of Girl Power Organization, the Program and Event Director of the Afghanistan Women's National Football Team, Ambassador to Street Child World Cup, and the Event Manager & Mentor/ Refugee Consultant in COLUM. She is also the former leader of the Afghanistan women's Football Committee, former Finance Officer of the Afghanistan Football Federation, former captain of the Afghan women's national football team, and former football coach of the under-17 and under-15 women's football teams in Afghanistan.
Roya Rahmani is an Afghan diplomat who served as Afghanistan's first female ambassador to the United States and non-resident ambassador to Mexico, Argentina, Colombia, and the Dominican Republic from December 2018 to July 2021. She is currently the Chair of the international advisory company in development finance — Delphos International LTD. She is also a distinguished fellow at the Georgetown Institute for Women, Peace, and Security, a senior advisor at the Atlantic Council's South Asia Center, and a senior fellow for international security at the New America Foundation. From 2016 to 2018, she served as Afghanistan's first female ambassador to Indonesia, first ever ambassador to the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, and non-resident ambassador to Singapore.
Somaya Faruqi is an Afghan student and engineer, and the captain of the Afghan Girls Robotics Team, also known as the "Afghan Dreamers." She was named to the BBC's 100 Women in 2020 and was featured by UNICEF in 2020 as well as the UN Women Generation Equality campaign in 2021. During the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, her team designed a prototype ventilator to help fight the coronavirus in Afghanistan.
The Afghan Girls Robotics Team, also known as the Afghan Dreamers, is an all-girl robotics team from Herat, Afghanistan, founded through the Digital Citizen Fund (DCF) in 2017 by Roya Mahboob and Alireza Mehraban. It is made up of girls between ages 12 and 18 and their mentors. Several members of the team were relocated to Qatar and Mexico following the fall of Kabul in August 2021. A documentary film featuring members of the team, titled Afghan Dreamers, was released by MTV Documentary Films in 2023.
Zahra Joya is an Afghan journalist. She is the founder of Rukhshana Media, an outlet in Persian and English which she runs from exile.
Pashtana Durrani is an Afghan human rights activist focused on girls' and women's access to education.