Course content. Module 1

Malala Yousafzai is a Pakistani female education activist and the youngest recipient of the Nobel Prize. Malala's fight for education started at the age of 11 when she wrote an anonymous online diary about the life of a schoolgirl in Pakistan's Swat Valley under the Taliban. A New York Times documentary about her life as the Pakistani military interfered in the area was made by journalist Adam Ellick the following summer. 

A masked gunman boarded her school bus on 9 October 2012 and asked, "Who is Malala?" Then, in an assassination attempt in revenge for her activism, the Pakistani Taliban gunman shot Malala and two other girls. Badly injured on the left side of her head, Malala woke up in a hospital in Birmingham, UK, 10 days later.

Following her recovery, Malala became a prominent activist for the right to education. She co-founded the Malala Fund, a non-profit organization. In 2013, she co-authored I Am Malala, an international best seller.

“For her struggle against the suppression of children and young people and for the right of all children to education”, Malala was co-awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2014, thus becoming the youngest ever Nobel laureate. She graduated with a degree in Philosophy, Politics and Economics from the University of Oxford in 2020 and continues her fight for the right of girls to education.

Watch Malala’s story here:

Self-reflection: What are the links between education and citizenship in the case of Malala Yousafzai?