The girls attending the Mirwais School for Girls in Afghanistan have learned to be brave — and are providing an inspirational lesson in defiance.

About two months ago, 15 girls on their way to the school were victims of an acid attack meant to terrorize them into staying home. It’s believed the Taliban was to blame. Though some of the girls are permanently scarred — and in some cases a bit blind — the student body refuses to back down and returned to school. Not only are nearly all of those victims back at the Mirwais School for Girls, but all 1,300 female students are back at their desks.

"My parents told me to keep coming to school even if I am killed," one victim, Shamsia Husseini, 17, told The New York Times. "The people who did this to me don’t want women to be educated. They want us to be stupid things."

At the school, girls are free to take off their head-to-toe burkas, and to laugh and play in ways they can’t in the surrounding region, where fear of the Taliban runs rampant. Headmaster Mahmood Qadari convinced petrified parents to send their daughters back to school after the attacks. "I told them, if you don’t send your daughters to school, then the enemy wins," Qadari told the Times. "I told them not to give in to darkness. Education is the way to improve our society."

During Hillary Clinton’s confirmation hearing Tuesday, Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-CA, said "no woman or girl should have to grow up and face persecution for having being born female, and referred to acid attacks common against women in Pakistan. Clinton said the issue is "central to our foreign policy." 

"It is heartbreaking beyond words that, you know, young girls are attacked on their way to school by Taliban sympathizers and members who do not want young women to be educated." Clinton responded, "This is not culture. This is not custom. This is criminal. And it will be my hope to persuade more government … that we cannot have a free, prosperous, peaceful, progressive world if women are treated in such a discriminatory and violent way."

Kudos to these families and girls for standing up to terror and defying the odds. Hopefully, such bravery can help defeat the Taliban, Al-Qaeda, and other groups trying to keep Afghanistan in the dark ages.