coeducational schools is controversial in As-Suwayda community
As-Suwayda – North-Press Agency
Gibran Marouf
The visit of a small group of people of As-Suwayda governorate, southern Syria, the House of the Muslims Druze community in the city of As-Suwayda, and their complaint to Sheikh Akel, Yousef Jarbou, about the decision of the Directorate of Education to convert all secondary and high schools into mixed schools . The matter that sparked a community debate among the people dividing them into objectors and supporters regarding the generalization of mixing in schools.
Requiring respect for privacy
“Education must respect the privacy of the conservative society, we are against mixing, and we wouldn’t accept it neither for our daughters nor for our sons”, Abu Shibli, a religious person from As-Suwayda told North-Press.
He added that, “especially at this time, where problems and vice are spread and morals are deteriorating, as observing students has declined, even teaching staff in schools are no longer able to control students. It is well known that this age is the most dangerous one which young people, males and females experience”.
He pointed out that “in case of the absence of schools for girls and others for boys, the Directorate of Education would be committing a crime against many students, who will be deprived of continuing their studies”.
Positivity of mixing
Hani Shater, a father of three students children, told North-Press: “I am with the generalization of coeducational schools, and I even studied all grades in coeducational schools, as I noticed that there is a big difference between us and students studying in one gender schools for males”.
“We had overcome the complexity of talking with girls, as we have developed friendly relations between each other till this day, and the proportion of commitment by students is greater, while the proportion of violence is less, which is a motivation to improve the level of educational attainment”, Hani added.
He pointed out that “throughout the study I did not witness any ethical problems in school, as it even formed family relations between the young people”.
Familiar habits
For her part, Intisar commented on the news regarding the demand of some people to prevent coeducational schools, saying: “It is very shameful that after a high stage of culture and education in our society, some people still demand the separation of girls from boys”.
“It is shameful for our governorate to retreat from our habits,” she said. “Throughout our lifetime, the son of neighbors is a brother and the daughter of a neighbor is a sister”.
“It is the boys and girls who will refuse the separation,” she said, calling on those who demand gender separation to stop the extremist way of thinking and work to “raise the morale of children to embrace science and the future, educate them and develop awareness to protect them from all dangers”, Intisar added.
objectives and results
A source at the Directorate of Education in As-Suwayda said that he was surprised, in an interview with North-Press, about the reason for this controversy regarding mixing in schools, noting that “since the schools were established in the governorate of As-Swayda some decades ago, they had adopted coeducational system, especially in the countryside, and there were only a few schools that adopted one gender system in the city, and there was no problem with that”.
He added: “The decision to convert schools into mixed ones was taken and began to be implemented since last year, we have noticed the success of the experiment, as the outstanding students graduated from these schools, so the decision was taken to complete the process of gender integration”.
He pointed out that “the application of the mixed system has other goals, including the registration of students in schools nearby their houses, which reduces the costs their parents pay, in addition to saving expenses in schools”, adding that “there are schools of which the mixed system has been applied with the desire of parents”.
“The Directorate of Education in As-Suwayda has excluded for this year “Tawfiq Mezher School” for girls and “Ahmed Juma School” for boys, from the integration system, taking into account the existence of a small group that fears the coeducational system”, he added.