An Investigation of the Educational Integration of Afghan Immigrants in Iran

In the past four decades, Iran has hosted the largest population of foreign immigrants, mostly from Afghanistan and Iraq and currently, Iran ranks as the second country in accepting the most Afghan immigrants after Pakistan. After safety and economics, education is one of the most important factors in attracting Afghan immigrants to Iran. Public schools, universities, literacy movements, private schools, and charity schools in Iran have made education possible for all migrants with any social status or level of education. However, this education is tied to difficulties such as family economic issues, providing identity documents, deliberate obstacles, personal preferences, religious concerns, disagreement of local people, etc. This paper studies the situation of educational integration and the difficulties regarding the habitation of afghan immigrants in Shahrak-e Qaem in Qom who have formed half of its inhabitants. The author used interviews and participation along with observation for gathering the data. This data is extracted from the research on immigrants' lifestyles, and is visualized based on qualitative analyses of their experiences in domains such as studies, social networks, economics, and bureaucracies.