Hama School Principal to Welat TV: Few Schools Selected to Teach Kurdish, We Demand Expansion to All Kurdish Villages

Welat TV – Erbil

Huda Saeed, principal of a school in the village of Sawa in the Hama countryside, welcomed the Syrian Education Ministry’s decision to introduce Kurdish-language instruction in public schools, saying her village’s school was not among the five schools selected for the program in the province.

Speaking to Welat TV on Friday, September 11, 2026, Saeed said the residents of the village are Kurds and had previously submitted requests to government authorities and officials to introduce Kurdish-language education in schools in the area. She said limiting the program in Hama province to just five schools came as a surprise to residents.

She explained that students, particularly those in the first and second grades, face significant difficulties studying in Arabic, arguing that teaching their mother tongue in schools would help them overcome these challenges.

Saeed also pointed to the lack of specialized Kurdish-language teachers in the area and called on the Syrian government to provide qualified teaching staff, particularly after years of restrictions on learning and teaching Kurdish.

According to Saeed, Hama province and its countryside are home to around 50 Kurdish villages, including 13 villages where Kurds make up 100 percent of the population. She stressed that students in the area want to learn their mother tongue and are enthusiastic about having it incorporated into the education system.

938 Schools Approved to Teach Kurdish

The Syrian Education Ministry has officially approved 938 schools to teach Kurdish as a national language across four provinces as part of the implementation of Presidential Decree No. 13 of 2026, which provides for the inclusion of Kurdish in the official education curriculum.

The ministry said through its official accounts on Thursday, September 10, that the approved schools include 608 in Hasaka province, 308 in Aleppo, 17 in Damascus, and five in Hama.

Under the decision, Kurdish will be taught in three classes per week, while studying the language will be optional for students as part of the transitional implementation of the policy.

The approval of the additional schools follows the issuance of Presidential Decree No. 13 of 2026, which stipulated the inclusion of Kurdish in the official education curriculum, in a move aimed at regulating Kurdish-language instruction in the schools covered by the decision.