Going forward towards normal.

We’re not going back to normal. Not this summer, not this fall, not this year, not ever. Not anywhere in the world, not in Afghanistan, and not at SOLA.

We’re not going back to normal.

We’re going forward towards it.

We’re going forward, and let me tell you what that means for us and our students.

Many of you know that schools in Afghanistan are currently closed by order of the government – many of you also know that SOLA is abiding by these directives. In Kabul, the mandated closure officially extends through next Saturday, May 9. That said, all of us have to assume that there’s a very real possibility that the closure order may be pushed back until after this year’s Eid celebrations on May 23rd…or perhaps even further than that.

Right now, SOLA, as a physical entity, is closed. Our students are home. Our campus is quiet.

But SOLA is much more than just a campus.

We are more than 80 students in grades 6-10, and we are their families. We are teachers, we are staff, we are administration. We are a worldwide community, and we are the future we’re building for our country.

Our campus may be quiet – but we are not.

Schools globally are transitioning their in-class model to an online model, finding ways to engage their students at a distance, and SOLA is no exception.

We’re currently in the process of determining our students’ access to communication technology. This access varies widely: in our incoming 6th grade class, for instance, all but two students are able to use the internet at home and every student has an immediate family member who owns a smartphone. For our returning 10th graders, however, less than half have internet access at home and roughly 25% either have no cellphone in the house or only a phone that just receives calls and text messages.

This means we need to be creative – and that’s something we’re very good at.

Our teachers, as you read this, are building and developing their curricula so that they’ll be able to deliver a classroom experience without the classroom. Our intention, by summer, is to be able to operate entirely virtually, with students receiving assignments and communicating with teachers via phone, text, and email. If COVID-19 keeps our students from coming to SOLA, then we’re going to bring SOLA to them.

We aren’t going to get back to normal. None of us are. Instead, we must choose to go forward towards normal. Education is changing, in the West as much as in Afghanistan. We are all learning, in real time, how best to communicate with students without removing them from the safety of their home environments, and how best to deliver the most impactful curriculum possible in this new reality.

This is a challenge. This is an opportunity. We’re going to rise to it, we’re going to meet it, and we’re going to thrive in it. This won’t be easy. Nothing good ever is.

We are SOLA. We are the School of Leadership, Afghanistan. Adversity tests leadership, and adversity forges it. What we do during these next weeks and months – what we choose to do – will stand as our legacy and our promise.

We are SOLA. We are students, we are families, we are supporters, we are believers. We are parents, we are children, we are sisters, we are brothers.

We are leaders.

And we are going forward.