May 4, 2006--Boola, Boola
As high school seniors across the country wait trepidatiously by their mailboxes eagerly looking for those fat envelopes from the Ivy League colleges to which they applied, there is another student, Sayed Rahmatullah Hashemi, a former ambassador for the Taliban, who also is waiting--to hear from the Admissions Office at Yale.
Yes, that Yale.
How, you might ask, is this possible? Why isn’t he interned at Camp X-Ray in Gitmo? That I cannot tell you. Some claim that he is in this country on a student visa because he was in fact an agent for the CIA.
I can, though, tell you that he is currently enrolled at Yale as a non-degree seeking, so-called non-traditional student in a special program designed for adults who have returned to college after taking time out to raise families and work. As far as I know, Mr. Hashemi does not have a family of his own but his line of work has for sure been non-traditional.
The NY Times reports today (see link below) that he has applied to the traditional undergraduate program at Yale and is waiting to hear if he will be admitted. You might imagine that this has ignited quite the controversy.
Some alums have started a blog called NailYale to remind us that the Taliban ripped off the nails of any women found to be using nail polish. After an anti-Taliban protester tore off her burka in his presence, Hashemi is quoted as having said, “"I'm really sorry for your husband. He might have a very difficult time with you."
Everyone at Yale is struggling with this, including students and staff at the Slifka Center for Jewish life. They know that the Taliban ordered all non-Muslims--chiefly Hindus--to wear yellow badges, reminiscent of what the Nazi required of the Jews during the 1930s and 40s. But they still allow Hashemi to take his meals with them since Kosher food is acceptable to Muslims.
As a former administrator of degree programs for adults, we encouraged our students to apply for life-experience credit. If they had run a business, we suggested they apply for credit in Business Management; if they had been life long readers of contemporary literature, write a paper about that and maybe thereby earn some academic credit.
In my perverse way, if Mr. Hashemi is admitted to Yale (my guess by the way is that he will get the skinny envelope), I can’t help but imagine what he would turn in when seeking life-experience credit. As a roving ambassador for the Taliban, at a minimum, he should be able to get some credit for courses in Government as well as Political Science.
Gender Studies, however, might be a different matter.
Yes, that Yale.
How, you might ask, is this possible? Why isn’t he interned at Camp X-Ray in Gitmo? That I cannot tell you. Some claim that he is in this country on a student visa because he was in fact an agent for the CIA.
I can, though, tell you that he is currently enrolled at Yale as a non-degree seeking, so-called non-traditional student in a special program designed for adults who have returned to college after taking time out to raise families and work. As far as I know, Mr. Hashemi does not have a family of his own but his line of work has for sure been non-traditional.
The NY Times reports today (see link below) that he has applied to the traditional undergraduate program at Yale and is waiting to hear if he will be admitted. You might imagine that this has ignited quite the controversy.
Some alums have started a blog called NailYale to remind us that the Taliban ripped off the nails of any women found to be using nail polish. After an anti-Taliban protester tore off her burka in his presence, Hashemi is quoted as having said, “"I'm really sorry for your husband. He might have a very difficult time with you."
Everyone at Yale is struggling with this, including students and staff at the Slifka Center for Jewish life. They know that the Taliban ordered all non-Muslims--chiefly Hindus--to wear yellow badges, reminiscent of what the Nazi required of the Jews during the 1930s and 40s. But they still allow Hashemi to take his meals with them since Kosher food is acceptable to Muslims.
As a former administrator of degree programs for adults, we encouraged our students to apply for life-experience credit. If they had run a business, we suggested they apply for credit in Business Management; if they had been life long readers of contemporary literature, write a paper about that and maybe thereby earn some academic credit.
In my perverse way, if Mr. Hashemi is admitted to Yale (my guess by the way is that he will get the skinny envelope), I can’t help but imagine what he would turn in when seeking life-experience credit. As a roving ambassador for the Taliban, at a minimum, he should be able to get some credit for courses in Government as well as Political Science.
Gender Studies, however, might be a different matter.
posted by Steven Zwerling at
11:51 AM
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