– November 14, 2012 – She has touched the hearts of millions, with her bold spirit and her liberating belief that girls everywhere have the right to an education. At age 11, as a child activist in Pakistan writing a blog for the British Broadcasting Corp., Malala Yousafzai defied the Taliban and denounced atrocities and oppression in the remote Swat Valley, her home. For years, she spoke up when others were cowed into silence. And when the Taliban could take no more and sent an assassin to shoot her in the head on her school bus on Oct. 9, hoping to silence her forever, she survived and battled back from a bullet that grazed her brain. At 15, Malala has become “Pakistan’s daughter,” an icon of courage and a beacon of hope for millions around the world. Today she is recovering in a British hospital. More than a million people have signed the I am Malala petition and others like it on behalf of the 32 million girls in Pakistan and elsewhere who have no access to schooling, reports Gordon Brown, the former British prime minister and United Nations special envoy for global education. The UN declared Nov. 10 Malala Day in her honour, to highlight the needs of school-age girls around the world. Because of her the Pakistani government is offering the families of poor children a small stipend to send them to primary school.