Malala Yousafzai, the women’s rights activist who was considered such a threat by the Taliban at just 15 years old that they shot her, has been offered a place at the prestigious University of Oxford in the United Kingdom to study Philosophy, Politics and Economics.
The 20-year-old tweeted the good news today, as she and thousands of other young Britons received the results of their A-Levels, the British answer to the HSC/VCE/etc, etc.
So excited to go to Oxford!! Well done to all A-level students – the hardest year. Best wishes for life ahead! pic.twitter.com/miIwK6fNSf
— Malala Yousafzai (@Malala) August 17, 2017
In March, Yousafzai reportedly received a conditional offer to study at Oxford if she received three A grades – clearly the girl fucking nailed it.
And the public is bloody well stoked for her, as y’know people like J.K. Rowling send their congratulations.
Congratulations, Malala! X
— J.K. Rowling (@jk_rowling) August 17, 2017
Congrats to Malala Yousafzai for being accepted into Oxford! And congrats to Oxford for having her.
— Eugene Gu, MD (@eugenegu) August 17, 2017
https://twitter.com/RupertMyers/status/898104278409236480
Yousafzai, who was born in Swat, Pakistan, was shot in her head, neck and shoulder by a Taliban gunman on her way home from school in 2012, because of her outspokenness on the education of girls.
After Taliban militants took control of her hometown in 2007, girls were banned from going to school in Swat at the end of 2008, when she was 11. She began to blog as ‘Gul Makai’ for the BBC, detailing life under the Taliban, and publicly campaigning for girls’ rights to education. After the Pakistani army drove the Taliban out of Swat, schools for girls reopened in 2011.
After the attempt on her life, Yousafzai was treated in Birmingham, UK, where she and her family now live, and where she completed high school. She has since continued to advocate for the issues of girls’ education and equality, and published her memoir ‘I Am Malala‘ in 2013.
She became the youngest-ever Nobel Prize laureate when she won the Nobel Peace Prize at age 17 in 2014, along with Kailash Satyarthi “for their struggle against the suppression of children and young people and for the right of all children to education“.
Earlier this year, she became the youngest person to be designated a United Nations Messenger of Peace, the UN Secretary-General António Guterres calling her a “symbol of perhaps the most important thing in the world, education for all“.
In her acceptance speech, Yousafzai said: “[Bringing change starts with us and it should start now… If you want to see our future bright, you have to start working now [and] not wait for anyone else.”
