On Fri, 17-year-erstwhile Malala Yousafzai became the youngest person -- and the commencement Pakistani -- ever to win the Nobel Peace Prize.

Malala was shot in the head past the Taliban in 2012 for daring to seek an instruction. Since and then, the young woman has been wowing the world with her backbone, her passion and her dedication to the fight for children's didactics and the rights of girls around the globe.

There are many reasons why Malala is an inspiration to united states all. Below, we have listed just a few of them:

The young woman is tremendously brave

YouTube/NDTV

Every bit early as 2008, Malala had already begun her fight for didactics rights. According to the Toronto Star, her father brought her to Peshawar to speak to a local press club in September of that yr. "How dare the Taliban take away my basic right to education?" she said to the group gathered, adding that she hid her textbooks under her clothes when she walked to school.

Malala was simply 11 at the time.

Since the failed assassination attempt, terrorists have said that they will "attack" her again if they get the adventure; only Malala, who — at the age of 11 besides began writing a blog for the BBC, describing her life under Taliban rule — has refused to exist intimidated.

"If I speak truly, I'm a piffling flake scared of ghosts," she famously told NDTV in 2013. "But I'm not agape [of the Taliban]. No, non at all."

She'south also tremendously empathetic

YouTube/Comedy Central

Malala famously left "The Daily Show"'south Jon Stewart speechless when she told him what she would tell a member of the Taliban if she e'er met one face to face.

She said: "I would tell him how important education is and that I would even desire didactics for your children as well. That's what I want to tell you. Now practise what you lot want."

She's fighting for every child'due south right to go to school

YouTube/United Nations

Last year, on July 12, when the Un declared the teenager's birthday "Malala Twenty-four hour period," the youngster stood up to address the dignitaries gathered and told them nigh how she represents the estimated 57 million children around the globe who are not currently going to school.

"'Malala Twenty-four hour period' is not my solar day," she said in a speech delivered at the U.North. in New York. "Today is the mean solar day of every adult female, every boy and every girl who have raised their voice for their rights."

"Ane kid, 1 instructor, one book and one pen tin modify the world," she said later on. "Instruction is the only solution. Education first."

And she's inspiring millions of others to do the same

Malala advocates for young women everywhere

AP Photograph/Olamikan Gbemiga

"Nosotros must assistance girls fight all the obstacles in their lives, and stand up and speak bravely and overcome the fear they accept in their hearts," Malala said at a individual dinner in Baronial, per Forbes.

A month before, the young woman had met with Nigerian President Goodluck Jonathan in Abuja, Nigeria, to advocate for the 219 schoolgirls kidnapped by terrorist group Boko Haram.

At the time, Malala addressed the girls' captors: "Lay downwards your weapons. Release your sisters. Release my sisters. Release the daughters of this nation. Let them be gratuitous. They have committed no criminal offense."

And her system, Malala Fund, is changing the world

AP Photo/Mohammad Hannon

Malala said at this twelvemonth's Clinton Global Initiative that her fund is pledging a $iii million multi-yr commitment, in partnership with Echidna Giving, to back up education initiatives in developing countries, co-ordinate to ABC News.

Also this year, Malala and other team members from her fund helped hundreds of Syrian children refugees cross from their war-torn country into Jordan. Malala and her organization have been advocating for the more than 1 1000000 displaced Syrian refugee children and helping them get admission to education.

(In the photograph above, Malala is pictured chatting with a xvi-year-old Syrian refugee during a visit to a refugee camp near the Syrian border, in Mafraq, Jordan, Tuesday, Feb. 18, 2014.)

She won't let haters stand in her way

AP Photo/Susan Walsh

She has supporters worldwide, just Malala has also endured her fair share of criticism.

She has, for example, been accused past some of abandoning her ain people and becoming a Western mouthpiece. Responding to these accusations, she told the BBC last yr: "My begetter says that teaching is neither Eastern or Western. Education is education: it's the right of anybody."

And her dreams are large and wonderful

Malala told CNN's Christiane Amanpour last year that she hopes to one day be the prime number minister of Pakistan. "Through politics, I tin serve my whole country," she said.

The youngster is a believer in big dreams. "The important thing is to ever ask the world to do some things. But sometimes they cannot be done, then yous have to take a stab and you have to do them," she said in August.

Malala, we applaud you.

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