The Welfare Organization of Iran has announced plans for the establishment of 100 day cares in the country’s mosques.
Homayoon Hashemi, the head of the Welfare Organization, reported: “One of our office’s new programs this year is issuing 100 permits for day cares in the country’s mosques.”
He maintained that the mosques have the appropriate resources and atmosphere to teach religious and spiritual values to children.
In March, the head of Tehran’s Welfare Office announced that day care organizers are forbidden from including “immoral programs such as song and dance” in day care curricula.
The control of educational programs, especially at the daycare level, has been a top priority of Iranian authorities.
The Iranian establishment has been hard at work trying to “cleanse” its education programs of so-called Western elements to put them more in line with Islamic principles, ever since Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei pointed to the infiltration of “Western values and teachings” in the education system as being at the root of the mass protests that rocked the country after the controversial presidential elections of 2009.
Even mixed day cares offering programs to both genders have been criticized and they are only permitted in places where low enrolment numbers do not allow for segregation.
