Pakistan’s Malala to be honoured with Harvard leadership award for activism
Nobel Prize laureate Malala Yousafzai is being honoured by Harvard University for her work promoting girls’ education.
Harvard’s Kennedy School says Yousafzai will be awarded the 2018 Gleitsman Award at a ceremony on Dec 6.
The award honors Yousafzai, co-founder of Malala Fund, for her courageous leadership of a global movement to equip girls with 12 years of free, quality, and safe education.
“Malala speaks powerfully to the strength and perseverance of women and girls who are oppressed,” said David Gergen, professor of public service at Harvard Kennedy School and director of the Center for Public Leadership. “Her remarkable story has inspired girls — and boys as well — to follow in her footsteps and has activated a generation of practitioners and legislators who are fighting for equality in their own communities.
“Alan Gleitsman, whose philanthropy made this award possible, believed in individuals whose vision inspired others to confront injustice,” Gergen continued. “He was an ardent supporter of Harvard Kennedy School’s efforts to cultivate the world’s youngest changemakers and would be so pleased by today’s announcement.”
Yousafzai became the youngest person to win the Nobel Peace Prize in 2014 when she was recognised for her global work supporting schooling for all children.
As a teen in Pakistan, she survived an assassination attempt by the Taliban. She later founded the nonprofit Malala Fund to support her work.
Now 21, Yousafzai is a student at Oxford University in England.