As Afghan women return to the classroom, they’re confronted with a flash from the past as hierarchy comes to the education system.

For the first time since the Taliban’s takeover, students are returning to their studies at Afghanistan universities.

Female students are among those included in the return, a move many thought wouldn’t happen under the group’s governance.

But it doesn’t come without change.

Afghan women now have to learn with a curtain or board placed in the middle of the classroom to divide them from their male counterparts.

Meanwhile, other reports suggest female students are excluded from sections of the university altogether.

On a path to traditional ways

Many Afghan women feared their right to accessing education would be revoked under the Taliban.

While this isn’t the case, many feel that they’re on a path to returning to traditional ways.

“Putting up curtains is not acceptable,” Anjila, a 21-year-old student at Kabul University who returned to find her classroom partitioned, told Reuters.

“I really felt terrible when I entered the class … We are gradually going back to 20 years ago.”

A document circulating private universities suggests new guidelines and policies women must follow if they wish to return to campus.

Such new rules include mandatory wearing of hijabs and separate entrances for women.

It’s also been reported that female teachers are only allowed to teach a female cohort in some circumstances.

While it’s unclear if this document is from the Taliban, a spokesperson told Reuters that dividers in classrooms to separate male and female congregations is acceptable and that they ask women to keep studying.

Are they really supporting women’s rights?

Under the Taliban’s previous rule from 1996 to 2001, girls and women were banned from attending school and work.

But as the group works to uphold their promise in supporting women’s rights, this rule has been overturned for now.

It comes as the Taliban acts on their bid to support women’s rights however authorities aren’t holding their breath about what this means and how this will pan out in practice.

Classes were mostly empty on Monday, with many students and teachers fleeing the country in the weeks prior.

A journalism professor at Herat University told Reuters that less than a quarter of his 120 student cohort attended class, with many unsure if they had made the right decision.

“Students were very nervous today,” he said.

“I told them to just keep coming and keep studying and in the coming days the new government will set the rules.”

Written by Rebecca Borg