Traditional teaching methods seek to ensure memory retention through rote. This method may also be noted in many secular schools in spite of a pre-war network of well-established teacher training institutes in Kabul and major provincial centers which provided 2-year and 4-year courses largely for primary teachers. The Faculty of Education at Kabul University taught pedagogy and administration; other faculties trained teachers in general knowledge and specialized subjects such as literature and languages, geophysics, social science, archaeology, and theology.
Afghan women have always been attracted to the teaching profession because it is regarded as a culturally acceptable career for women. After the war began in 1978, however, many qualified teachers, male and female, opted for resettlement abroad. NGOs seek to fill this gap, but because of limited allocations of funds, salaries are mostly months in arrears, trained male teachers often prefer to work as day laborers while female teachers, even before the Taliban banned women from schools, worked without pay, or stayed at home.
Data as of 1997