Local Soldier, Unit Partner in Afghan Education

By Capt. Jacqueline Wren

is among the members of the 648th Maneuver Enhancement Brigade, Task Force Hydra, that alongside Afghan National Army officials participated in a groundbreaking ceremony for a school renovation in a neighboring community of Camp Black Horse and the Afghan Training Center east of Kabul.

The Pol-e Charki project is to both renovate the school and install a well that will provide drinkable water for the thousands of students the school serves.

Task Force Hydra is active throughout Kabul as the Kabul Base Cluster Command working with Kabul’s political leaders, religious leaders, police and ANA to provide humanitarian assistance and funding for projects that both provide better quality of life and employ local Afghan workers. This groundbreaking represented the beginning of a partnership between the Pol-e Charki community, the ANA and the TF Hydra Team at Camp Black Horse.

In partnership with the TF Hydra Civil Affairs team, Black Horse Camp Commander Lt. Col. Kevin Daniels worked with ANA Maj. Gen. Quadem Sha to choose a local project on which to collaborate. The two decided on a project that would invest in the future of Afghanistan and focus on the education of Afghan children.

“We all grabbed the opportunity to enhance the educational potential of over 7,000 students,” said Daniels about the school and his partnership with Quadem Sha and the ANA. “This event shows the children we all, ANA, U.S. and Coalition Forces, understand and share in the responsibility of our future; the children are our most treasured possessions.”

Saturday’s ceremony was well attended by both the students and their families. Task Force Hydra Commander, Col. Andy Hall was present to participate by shoveling some of the first ground that will be the future location of the admin building.

“Those are the faces of our future,” Hall said referring to the children that were present at the ceremony. “I expect quality work to be done here.”

The groundbreaking was also an opportunity for the teams to distribute more than 500 bags of school supplies collected by Operation Outreach, a soldier-run humanitarian organization, for the school’s head master to share with the students. Daniels, Hall and Quadem Sha personally handed out the supplies to students who were present.

In addition to providing a new school admin building, remodeling of the main classroom building and construction of the well, the project will employ 60 local Afghans.

The school is the site of one of the nine current humanitarian projects Task Force Hydra is currently overseeing.