When her soldier husband was sent to the frontlines a woman teacher in Tabuk found herself all alone and wanted to be transferred to a school closer to her parents. However, she was told by the ministry that it was not possible unless he had been martyred on the battlefield. This is the situation that secondary schoolteacher Hanan Al-Rifa'e now finds herself in. The mother of five, who has no one with her except her children, as her brothers are employed and cannot stay with her, had filed the transfer request hoping to be exempted from being appointed in a remote area of the country. Such postings are faced by the overwhelming majority of newly graduated female teachers. However, she was shocked by the response of officials. Al-Rifa'e received a letter from the Department of Teacher Affairs – that deals with teacher transfers at the ministry – rejecting her request because the school needed her and because there was no substitute. It said the yearly transfer of teachers is carried out automatically based on the need of schools. Her husband had to die first before she could get a transfer based on her circumstances. “There is no text in the articles regulating teacher transfers that stipulates transferring female teachers whose husbands are on a domestic or foreign assignment. It only approves transferring wives of martyrs,” the letter said. The Director of Girls Education in the region of Tabuk, Dr. Muhammad Al-Luhaidan, said the teacher's case has now been submitted to a higher authority at the Ministry of Education. Al-Rifa'e was appointed after graduation in the Al-Bada'a rural area, 240 km north of Tabuk.
