Undaunted: In the Aftermath of War, a Student From Afghanistan Pursues His Education in the United States
If you’d met Edris Tajik at Bard College earlier this summer, his life might have seemed like that of a typical college student. After graduating with a bachelor’s degree in political science in May, he was still living on campus, in Annandale-on-Hudson, New York, completing an internship and getting ready to move across the country for graduate school. He visited with classmates still on campus. He worked at the dining hall and as an usher at the performing-arts center. He exercised at the athletic center and slept in a dorm room with bare white walls and a box window fan unsuccessfully keeping the summer heat at bay.
Yet the 25-year-old’s experience over the past couple of years was far from ordinary. A refugee from Afghanistan, he fled the country in August 2021 amid the chaos of the United States’ withdrawal and the Taliban’s takeover. His life is proof of the power of education to transform lives — even in the aftermath of war.
Despite growing up mostly in Iran, with parents who had never had the opportunity to get an education, he returned in 2016 to Afghanistan, where he was born, to finish high school and earn a college degree. He planned to pursue his interest in politics at Herat University, a public institution in the western Herat Province, and dreamed of ultimately making a meaningful contribution to the life of the nation. He was driven, he says, by “the deep love I hold for my homeland.”
But in August 2021, shortly before Tajik was to graduate from the university, history intervened. The United States withdrew its troops from Afghanistan, and the Taliban returned to power. Amid the chaos, Tajik managed to flee the country, taking an 18-hour bus ride to Kabul, where he boarded a plane to Qatar, and then flew to Germany. A few days later, he arrived in the United States. “I was uncertain about my destination and saddened as I left everything behind,” he recalls. But having spent years working on youth empowerment and peace-building efforts in Afghanistan, he knew he could have been targeted by the Taliban — and perhaps even in mortal danger — if he’d stayed.
After bouncing around the country for several months — staying on a military base in El Paso, Texas, before resettling for a short time in Chicago — Tajik received a scholarship to finish his degree at Bard. Now he’s ready to begin new educational journeys, with the ultimate goal of having a career in international relations. He’s shaped by the knowledge that education has been key to his success since he was a child — and that he doesn’t want future generations of young people to face the kinds of obstacles he encountered in pursuing an education.
Those challenges began well before his university years. Following the United States’ invasion of Afghanistan in 2001, Tajik moved with his family to Iran, where they had relatives. He says his parents didn’t keep track of the exact dates of various life events, since they aren’t able to read and write, but he knows they moved out of concern about political and economic stability in Afghanistan.
Life was not easy in Iran. Tajik had to work throughout most of his childhood, starting around the age of 10, selling food and cleaning shops. Since he was an undocumented immigrant, he wasn’t allowed to attend official Iranian schools. “I went to a school for refugees from Afghanistan run by other refugees from Afghanistan,” he recalls. “It wasn’t legal, actually. After a few years, the government of Iran shut it down.” (He was ultimately admitted to an Iranian school for one year, before completing the rest of his high-school education at a private school in Afghanistan. But understanding the inequities of educational access was formative and still motivates his studies and his work to this day.)
Despite the difficulties, Tajik developed an interest in current events and world affairs early on. “I can remember following the news when I was only 10 or 12 years old,” he says. “Reading newspapers, watching the news, listening to the radio, learning about politics.” He recalls finding a book at a library “that had the names, flags, capitals, and populations of every country, with information about their economies.” He didn’t understand much of it at the time, but he found it fascinating to look at. He knew he wanted to learn more.
Once at Herat University, Tajik combined his study of politics and law with work as an activist and educator. He helped with local peace-building efforts and worked as a program officer for the nonprofit Hope for Education and Leadership in Afghanistan, where he trained 240 students for Model United Nations, helping them develop their leadership abilities. This effort was part of what convinced Bard he’d be a good fit for one of the 100 full-tuition scholarships the college provided to displaced students from Afghanistan after the Taliban takeover. Tajik had begun looking for scholarships to complete his bachelor’s degree shortly after he arrived in America and found the Bard opportunity online. “His background was very compelling, with all the civil-society work he’d done,” says Jennifer Murray, Bard’s dean of international studies.
Of course, as Murray points out, that activism and hard-won education was precisely what put him in danger. “Most of the students who are here had a close relationship — or had a family member with a close relationship — to the U.S. military, NGOs, or other Western groups, so they very much felt they could be threatened and become targets” of the Taliban, she said. Tajik notes that educated people — almost by definition — are a threat to the Taliban’s rule.
Fortunately, his professional background also meant he had colleagues who reached out to help him evacuate when the U.S. forces departed. Before he left, though, he witnessed cities, districts, and provinces falling to the Taliban, which celebrated its victory in the streets. “Those last few months — there aren’t any words to describe them,” he says. “I would use the word ‘terrible,’ but it was even worse than that.”
With the rigors and uncertainty of his journey to safety behind him, Tajik began to look forward to returning to his studies. He says when he got the email about the scholarship to Bard, feelings of happiness — and security — swept over him. When he arrived on campus, despite the cultural differences, he says he didn’t struggle to adjust. Aside from the many other refugees from Afghanistan at Bard, he felt a seriousness of purpose, in terms of his studies, and spent much of his time focused on his schoolwork.
As grateful as Tajik is for the education he received in Afghanistan, he’s more aware of its limitations now that he’s been a student at Bard. “Everything was new to me — the teaching style, the class discussion,” he says. “It was exciting.” He adds that he did more writing at Bard than he did at Herat University and had the opportunity to talk about contemporary issues: “Back in Afghanistan, we really didn’t cover much of the news of the day. We mostly talked about the past.” He was also impressed by the variety of subjects in Bard’s liberal-arts curriculum and students’ ability to take classes in different disciplines.
Since coming to America, Tajik has had more professional experiences that have moved him farther along his career path. He interned for a congressional campaign, for the National Committee on American Foreign Policy, and for the Middle East Institute. He’s also continued to work to support himself with campus jobs. When he graduated in May, he posted a photo of himself with his diploma and a bouquet of flowers on LinkedIn. “I am deeply thankful to all who have stood by me through this journey, particularly the kind people of Bard College,” he wrote. “This achievement is as much yours as it is mine.”
Tajik isn’t finished with his education. He’s planning to complete two one-year master’s programs over the next couple of years. He received scholarships for the first one, a program in international relations at the University of Chicago, which he recently began. Starting in the fall of 2024, in an effort to learn more about China and the Chinese language, he hopes to complete the yearlong Schwarzman Scholars program at Tsinghua University, in Beijing, that’s focused on leadership and global affairs. Ultimately, he plans to try to find a job in Washington, D.C., a natural fit for a young person with a lifelong passion for politics.
Tajik says he’d love to contribute to a better Afghanistan someday — one in which the Taliban is no longer in power. “The ability to rebuild these societies depends on students being able to continue their education and gain professional skills and expertise,” Murray, the dean, says. Whatever Tajik does, he’ll bring a valuable perspective, not only as a young person who’s already amassed professional experience in his field, but also as someone whose life has been shaped — directly and dramatically — by foreign-policy choices and lack of access to education.
