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Nicholas Kristof Selects CAMFED as Grand Prize Winner of his Holiday Impact Prize

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"No force changes the world more than a girl with a book.” - Nicholas Kristof

No force changes the world more than a girl with a book. That’s how CAMFED, the grand prize winner of the 2020 Holiday Impact Prize, transforms the lives of young women and of the communities around them. CAMFED empowers girls and young women, and they in turn reshape their countries. Girls’ education may be the highest-return investment available in the world today.

Nicholas Kristof, New York Times Op-Ed Columnist

About the 2020 Holiday Impact Prize

Since 2009, New York Times columnist and two-time Pulitzer Prize winner Nicholas Kristof has written an annual “holiday gift guide” column to bridge a philanthropic gap: readers who wanted to help but didn’t know how, and heroic individuals and organizations who desperately needed resources but were off donors’ radar. 

Kristof’s 2020 column selected CAMFED as the Grand Prize Winner, and CAMFED has received donor funding to match dollar for dollar the first $500k raised through this campaign. 

Thanks to the training received through CAMA, Mwamba was able to set up a successful restaurant.

The World’s Highest-Return Investment

Girls’ education is key to tackling the world’s greatest challenges. Yet, even before COVID-19, 52.2 million girls in sub-Saharan Africa were out of school, and millions more are now at risk. In response, CAMFED’s pan-African movement is educating girls through a model that radically improves their prospects of becoming independent, influential women. 

Graduates in turn join forces with CAMFED and their communities to keep even more girls in school and accelerate their path to livelihoods and leadership – sustaining and multiplying the impact of your donation far into the future. 

We are led by young women who, like me, were once on the margins of society and have experienced firsthand the transformative power of education; so the injustice of exclusion and the power of opportunity are at the heart of everything we do. Girls educated with CAMFED’s support belong to Africa’s largest and fastest-growing network of young women leaders who are capitalizing on their own education to support many more girls through school.

Angeline Murimirwa, CAMFED Executive Director – Africa

Join us to ignite that multiplier today

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Nicholas Kristof connects with CAMFED’s  Angeline Murimirwa

Nick Kristof surprised Angie Murimirwa, CAMFED’s Executive Director – Africa, when he announced CAMFED as the Grand Prize winner of the 2020 Kristof Holiday Impact Prize during their conversation online. In this clip, they introduce CAMFED, and Nick explains why he’s asking his readers to support our movement. You can also: Watch a series of short clips from their conversation or watch the full conversation (17 mins).

I think my readers will be very pleased to be investing not just in drones, but in a more powerful tool to bring about long-term change, and that is the education of girls. A lot of things are very expensive, but giving a girl an education is one of the few bargains left.

Nicholas Kristof, New York Times Op-Ed Columnist

 

Your gift can transform a girl’s life

The Holiday Impact Prize will support CAMFED’s work to educate 5 million girls by 2025, providing a crucial combination of financial, social and peer support for them to attend school and thrive – all led by young women who have lived and overcome poverty and exclusion themselves. 

$150 can support a girl in high school for a year, including dedicated mentorship from a young woman trained to help improve her confidence, life skills and learning.

In her conversation with Nick Kristof, Angeline emphasizes that no donation is too small. The lack of something as small as a pen or a notebook can keep a girl out of school. Educating girls is a collective effort, multiplied by CAMFED’s young women leaders.

How we multiply your investment

Girls’ education has the power to tackle the world’s most pressing challenges – from poverty and gender inequity to global instability and climate change – and CAMFED is a pan-African movement with a revolutionary model for delivering on this promise. Every graduate, on average, supports at least another three more girls in turn. This is what we call the Multiplier Effect – the impact a girl’s education has on others’ lives, and on the health, wealth and equality of our world.

The CAMFED Multiplier Effect in action - one girl helps 3, who each help 3 more through education

Thank you to our generous recent donors

Together we are breaking the cycle of poverty

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Matthew Reid-Schwartz $100

Albert Zabin $150

Rachel Nance $160

JOCELYN FARIS $40

Margaret Oldham £120

Claire Isenhart $15

Sandy Michaud $50

Enrique Loy $299

Neha Kulkarni $100

Erin Connors $250

Judith Barlow $500

Joel Mandel $13

Reisa Mukamal $100

Stephen Watkins £25

Roni Grossman $1800