Uploaded September 2024 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago
“Girls are not only the future, we are the present.” Sania, 19, an alum of our Girl Activist Fellowship, said at the What Girls Want demonstration in front of the UN on September 21, 2024, ahead of the #SummitOfTheFuture. “I am part of a unified group of sisters who are done asking for permission. We are here to claim what is rightfully ours. The table will always be stronger when it is shared.”
Girls around the world agree. Today is the day for world leaders to be accountable to girls and their demands, all of which are available at WhatGirlsWant.com
In New York City, more than 50 young women from around the world – including the youngest Nobel Prize Laureate Malala Yousafzai – gathered to take United Nations member states to task for failing to prioritize girls and young women in the planning and content of the upcoming Summit of the Future.
At a demonstration in front of the UN, surrounded by life-size cutouts of world leaders dressed ironically as youthful “girl experts”, the activists delivered a strong message: world leaders aren’t the experts on what girls want and need for their futures – girls are.
The group is backed by an informal coalition of girl-centered non-profit organizations, institutions, networks, and funds who worked to synthesize the well-documented policy, programming, and resourcing demands of girls at WhatGirlsWant.com
Video by Mahina Martinson/Malala Fund
“Girls are not only the future, we are the present.” Sania, 19, an alum of our Girl Activist Fellowship, said at the What Girls Want demonstration in front of the UN on September 21, 2024, ahead of the #SummitOfTheFuture. “I am part of a unified group of sisters who are done asking for permission. We are here to claim what is rightfully ours. The table will always be stronger when it is shared.”
Girls around the world agree. Today is the day for world leaders to be accountable to girls and their demands, all of which are available at WhatGirlsWant.com
In New York City, more than 50 young women from around the world – including the youngest Nobel Prize Laureate Malala Yousafzai – gathered to take United Nations member states to task for failing to prioritize girls and young women in the planning and content of the upcoming Summit of the Future.
At a demonstration in front of the UN, surrounded by life-size cutouts of world leaders dressed ironically as youthful “girl experts”, the activists delivered a strong message: world leaders aren’t the experts on what girls want and need for their futures – girls are.
The group is backed by an informal coalition of girl-centered non-profit organizations, institutions, networks, and funds who worked to synthesize the well-documented policy, programming, and resourcing demands of girls at WhatGirlsWant.com
Video by Mahina Martinson/Malala Fund
