Special Forces bring Afghan and American students together

Students and teachers from Jan Qadam school wave to students from Calvert City Elementary School. Coalition forces facilitated a video teleconference between elementary school children from Bagram, Afghanistan, and children from Calvert City, KY on Bagram Air Field April 16. U.S. Army photo by Staff Sgt. Marie Schult.

BAGRAM AIR FIELD, Afghanistan – Elementary school children from the U.S. and Afghanistan met face to face last night, over video teleconference, facilitated by the Combined Joint Special Operations Task Force-Afghanistan, as part of a partnership program and cultural exchange.

CJSOTF-A has been working with village elders, teachers, parents and students of the Jan Qadam Elementary School, outside the gates of Bagram Air Field, to enable the school to become a more effective center of education.

Coalition troops have been able to supply more than 1,200 students with notebooks, pens, pencils, backpacks, rulers and glue to get them started on a good school year, with the help of Calvert City elementary School in Calvert City, Kentucky.

The Jan Qadam students used a conference room on Bagram Air Field while the Calvert City students used a conference room at Fort Campbell, Ky.

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The first day of school at Jan Qadam was on March 24, when a dedication ceremony was held for the the new school library and science lab. The science lab is th eonly one in the Bagram school district. The library, filled with books from USAID, was dedicated to Gen. Baba Jan, a retired Afghan commander. Gen. Baba Jan donated the land to build the school on.