Saudi Arabia is a country known for extremist Islamic rules and laws that forbid women from voting, driving or simply leaving their house with out a male counterpart. On 14% of all Saudi women are employed. Times are changing and recently a group of 13 Saudi women entered into Dar Al-Hekma College, the first private, women-only college in Saudi Arabia, to study international diplomacy.

The program marks a partnership between Dar Al-Hekma and The Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University in Boston in the United States. Women will have the rare opportunity to study diplomacy in each location for several months, broadening their horizons and views on worldwide relations.”This group is the leading edge of modernity for women,” said Andrew Hess, a professor of diplomacy at Fletcher. “They’re going to become models for the other women, unless we have a huge conservative reaction.”

“We want women ambassadors, women officials, women leaders - not women working in the office,” said Suhair H. Al Qurashi, the school’s president. “We have a prepared group, and they are not secretary material.”

Let’s all send wishes and prayers to a real group of mavericks!