When Aqila Khan and Shaima Sadrudine arrived at Prospect Park in Whitehall two years ago as Afghan refugees who fled from the Taliban in their homeland, they knew almost no English.

Since shortly after their arrival, the women have been part of a group of refugees taking classes at the Family Literacy Center set up in a donated apartment at the Prospect Park Apartments by the Greater Pittsburgh Literacy Council.

After two years of lessons which include spelling, speaking and reading letters, numbers and words, the women are able to speak in short sentences and understand much of what is said to them in English.

Khan said she had gone from pointing to items at the supermarket to being able to call them by name and reading their prices. Understanding numbers has helped her to manage money more efficiently for her family of three children, she said.

Sadrudine said she hoped soon to know enough English to be an active participant in parent-teacher conferences for her five children.

But both women recently got the news that the ESL classes they attend might come to an end or face significant cutbacks because of a proposed approximately 75 percent budget cut to federal funds for adult education programs.

The federal budget President Bush proposed in February means a reduction in funds in Pennsylvania from $19.3 million to $4.8 million.

"If this cut comes at whatever level it comes, there are going to be a lot of hard choices and we certainly won't be able to carry on business as usual," said Karen Mundie, associate director of the Greater Pittsburgh Literacy Council.

The literacy council has been lobbying federal officials and elected representatives to reinstate full funding for adult education programs. The council got a boost in its efforts this month when a subcommittee of the U.S. House Appropriations Committee recommended a bill to restore the funding.

While literacy council officials say they are encouraged by the bill, they know they still face a lengthy effort to get full funding restored. For that to happen, the subcommittee bill must be approved by the full Appropriations Committee and then by the full U.S. House of Representatives. Then the same process must be repeated in the Senate.

Once both bodies have approved a budget, both versions go to a conference committee, which will develop a common bill that both bodies will vote on. The approved joint budget then goes to the president for his signature or veto.

Officials at Catholic Charities, which has been responsible for bringing a number of international refugees to the area, said they opposed any cuts to ESL programs.

"Really, those kinds of programs are investments that pay off very well in the future because that relatively small amount that it might cost to get someone into an English language class can be a critical piece of their preparation for going into the job market, and then they become self-sufficient," said Michael Andreola, communications director for Catholic Charities. "They become productive, working, taxpaying people in our society."

Mundie said ESL programs were funded by the state Department of Education as part of the Adult Literacy Basic Education. Even though state funds are used for the ESL programs, if the state receives significantly less federal funding, cuts are expected in the state-funded programs, Mundie said.

"What will happen is that the pot of money the state has available to fund programs will shrink. That little pot of money will have to be redivided by the state, and it stands to reason we would get substantially less money," Mundie said.

Mundie said the cuts would require layoffs at her agency and that it was unlikely the GPLC would be able to continue running all ESL programs for refugees at the sites it currently operates: Lawrenceville and Garfield for the Somali Bantu refugees; Prospect Park for the Afghan, Sudanese, Bosnian and other refugees; and a Downtown center to serve all groups.

During a recent ESL class at Prospect Park, taught by Family Literacy instructor Charlotte Sacharov, Khan, Sadrudine and Rana Murad all lamented the possible end to the classes they attend. The center serves about 40 refugees and includes 13 families.

The daytime classes at the center are filled largely with women who are homemakers and some men who work night shifts. The night classes include more of the men who work during the day, said Sacharov, the Family Literacy coordinator at Prospect Park.

"This class is very good for me," Sadrudine said through her daughter, Shamila Muqamuzin, 14, who acted at times as her interpreter. "I come here to learn English, and if this class is over, we are not going to learn anything."

Shamila receives her ESL training in classes provided for refugee students by the Baldwin-Whitehall School District.

For Murad, 68, who is Sadrudine's mother-in-law, the classes have represented her first opportunity for any type of education. In Afghanistan, most women were not educated and remained illiterate.

For Khan, who lost her husband and one of her daughters in a rocket attack on their home in Afghanistan, learning English has helped her to become more independent and a more functional family head for the two sons and daughter she brought here.

She lost her right hand in the attack and her face was disfigured in the fire that followed. She has endured numerous surgeries to repair the damage to her face, and her improved language skills have allowed her to communicate with her doctor, she said.

But almost as importantly, the classes help her to look toward the future of building a life in America and get her mind off of the time that she suffered when her husband and daughter were killed and she was forced to flee her homeland.

"When she is at home, she just sits around and thinks about it," Shamila Muqamuzin said.

Learning to read and write helps the women become part of society and their children's education, Sacharov said. In addition, she said, the classes serve not only an academic purpose, but also a social one, and they are the women's link to various other social service agencies that can provide help to their families

"This is their exposure, their link to the outside world," Sacharov said.