Islamic primary school teachers get first Dutch degrees

Three women received the first Dutch degrees in “teaching in Islamic primary schools” on Wednesday, another example of the Dutch pragmatic approach to religious schooling despite recent ethnic tensions.

“Many Muslims live in our country and it is obvious that Islamic education will find its place here,” Amsterdam mayor Job Cohen said as he handed over the first degrees to Fatima Saber, 30, Farah Alerkan, 24, and Kirsten Hofstee, 22.

A student of the Almere teacher training college in the central northern Netherlands, Saber was the first who chose to follow the special training for teaching in Islamic primary schools set up two years ago. Since then some 70 students have chosen to follow in her footsteps.

The Netherlands has some 16 million inhabitants of whom more than 1 million are Muslims, often of immigrant origin. In the last few years the coexistence between the Muslim and the dominant Dutch culture has not always been easy, especially after tensions flared following the 2004 murder of filmmaker Theo van Gogh by a radical Muslim.

Read full article: AFP, Middle East Times, 25 May 2006