Contributors to Education: Education in "A Thousand Splendid Suns"

Contributors to Education Most Americans grow up constantly being told that education is extremely important and that the rest of his or her life depends on how he or she does in school. Of course, there are many factors that contribute to education, such as location or what subjects are studied. Education plays a part in A Thousand Splendid Suns, as seen when reading about Mariam and Laila, and the difference in their education and how it affects them. These differences include topics such as location, home environment, personal goals and type of schooling received. Mariam, for example, did not get a proper education, and this has several reasons behind it. Such as her location, being significantly more rural than Laila’s location, made schools less of an option. Children living in a rural environment are two times more likely to be out of school than urban children. ("Out-of-school Children." Out-of-school Children. Unesco, 2012. Web. 26 Aug. 2013.) This statistic also puts Laila’s education into perspective as well. She was more open to a public school because she lived in an urban area. As it was implied in the book, the school was only a few blocks away from her house, which means it was in walking distance from her, so she could have walked to school every day had her father not taken her. This brings up another major contributing factor for education, which is family influence. Because Laila’s father encouraged her to get the best possible education, she was more determined to do her best and make the most of it. Her father even gave her extra tutoring after school. In contrast, Mariam’s mother and father did not talk to her much about education at all. Her father was not around to encourage her to get one, and her mother prompted her to get a job instead of an education. The little education that Mariam did get was based solely on religion. She had a tutor as a child, who taught her out of the Qur’an, but other than that, she did not receive any proper education about other subjects. Conversely, Laila’s public education was based on many different subjects, such as math and science, and perhaps a religion class as well, in addition to the other ones. Also, her education continued for much longer than Mariam’s. Mariam was done with schooling at a very young age, when she had learned everything there was for her to learn from the Qur’an, while Laila was intent on pursuing further education, such as college. In that way, Laila’s personal goals differed from Mariam’s. Laila planned on getting the absolute best education and finding a supporting job. On the other hand, Mariam did not reveal much about her plans for the future. From the book, it was interpretable that her main priority was just staying alive and finding any job. She never thought much about education or found a need for it. Their personal goals may have been reflections of their home lives, which explains the major differences in their personal goals. The above contrasts in the two girls’ different lives are realistic examples about real life scenarios. While some children grow up in a household that is very serious about school and grades, some children do not get the support they need, or do not take their own education seriously. Sometimes, the child does not have the resources available to even get to school or get any type of education. And if they do get a few years of schooling, they may be studying subjects that are not beneficial to them later in their life. These issues are all dependent on individual situations, such as Laila’s or Mariam’s.