Malala Yousafzai to accept WHYY’s Lifelong Learning Award

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WHYY will honor Malala Yousafzai with its annual Lifelong Learning Award. The Pakistani activist for female education will come to Philadelphia to accept the award on April 14.

“Malala Yousafzai’s courage and commitment to education have inspired millions and set a global standard for advocacy in the face of adversity,” said Bill Marrazzo, president and CEO of WHYY. “Her leadership aligns directly with WHYY’s values around access to learning and civic responsibility.”

It’s been 13 years since Yousafzai was shot in the head by a Taliban gunman, targeted for being outspoken about allowing Pakistani girls to attend school. She was just 15 at the time and became a global icon not only for surviving the attack but also for using it to advance her activism.

Now 28, Yousafzai is a Nobel Peace Prize winner and a college graduate, having earned her degree in philosophy, politics and economics at Oxford University in 2020. With her father, she had launched the Malala Fund supporting female education worldwide. Last year Yousafzai published a memoir titled “Finding My Way.”

On the publication of her book, Yousafzai appeared on WHYY’s “Fresh Air.” Cohost Tonya Mosley asked her about moving away from home to attend university, where she had to learn to escape her status as an international education hero.

“I was reliving all the missed years of my childhood because of the activism that I had to take from such a young age,” Yousafzai said.

In the book, she describes experimenting with marijuana while at Oxford, which unexpectedly triggered suppressed sensations of the gunman attack years earlier. In the interview with Mosley, she described being haunted by intrusive thoughts that persisted well after the drug had worn off.

“I was shaking every minute. I could not look at harmful objects. I could not look at a knife. I could not watch news that said anything about murdering people or somebody being killed, shot or wounded,” Yousafzai said. “I just felt so disappointed with myself that somebody who actually faced a Taliban gunman was somehow now scared of these small things.”

The Lifelong Learning Award ceremony will feature a live, on-stage interview with Yousafzai by Terry Gross, cohost of “Fresh Air.”

In a statement, Yousafzai said she will accept the award because she has “seen the power of education to transform individual lives, families and communities around the world.” She said she is honored to return to Philadelphia to share her story.

Past recipients of the Lifelong Learning Award include musician Yo-Yo Ma, historian Henry Louis Gates Jr. and former President Joe Biden.

The award ceremony is a ticketed event with limited seating. You can find more Information about the event on WHYY’s website.