21 organisations across Pakistan, Nigeria, Brazil, Ethiopia and Tanzania join Malala Fund’s Education Champion Network to tackle systemic barriers keeping girls out of school.
Malala Fund today announced $4.8 million in new grants for 21 organisations advancing girls’ education in Nigeria, Pakistan, Brazil, Ethiopia and Tanzania. In line with the organisation’s 2025–2030 strategy, 66% of this funding (about $3.17 million) will support young women-led organisations — more than triple Malala Fund’s original target.
“I am incredibly proud that most of the funding we are awarding under our new strategy is going to organizations led by young women,” said Malala Yousafzai, Co-Founder and Executive Chair of Malala Fund. “From reducing the cost of books and transport for girls in rural Pakistan to ensuring married girls and young mothers in Nigeria can complete secondary school, our partners are leading the fight for girls to learn, even under the toughest circumstances.”
Malala Fund’s Education Champion Network (ECN) supports civil society organisations working to advance girls’ education and influence policy change and implementation in their countries. The new cohort of ECN grantee partners will address urgent threats — from child marriage and conflict to systemic gender and racial discrimination and shrinking education budgets — across five countries that together are home to 31 million out-of-school girls.
“Our partners are closest to the challenges holding girls back and are delivering bold, practical, systemic solutions so girls can get the education they deserve," said Lena Alfi, CEO of Malala Fund. "With girls’ rights under pressure and resourcing slipping worldwide, the smartest investment we can make is in the young women and seasoned activists who know exactly how to defend them.”
Malala Fund prioritises flexible, multi-year grants so that partners can devote resources to where they’re most needed — from policy advocacy and budget transparency to safe-school initiatives, re-entry policies for young mothers and the elimination of hidden school costs.
The new cohort of grantees will work to:
Nigeria: Scale gender-responsive budgeting, transparency and citizen oversight; support school re-entry for married and pregnant girls; and deploy digital tools that track education spending and infrastructure gaps.
Pakistan: Address the hidden costs (such as transport, materials, and uniforms) of girls attending school; restore flood-damaged schools; recruit female teachers; and build accountability for gender-responsive local budgets.
Brazil: Advocate for gender- and race-responsive education plans; make menstrual dignity laws a reality in schools; and strengthen sexual health and anti-violence programming so girls can stay in school.
Ethiopia: Advance national and regional adoption of the Safe Schools Declaration; train teachers and local officials on gender-based violence prevention; and create safe spaces and provide psychosocial support in conflict-affected areas.
Tanzania: Strengthen re-entry policies for young mothers; expand gender-based violence reporting in schools; and support legal reforms to set 18 as the minimum age of marriage with no exceptions.
Our focus countries — and specific regions within countries (as in Brazil) — have especially high numbers and rates of out-of-school girls. In particular, Nigeria and Pakistan are home to 15% of all out-of-school girls globally. In all these country contexts, we invest in local civil society organisations, building on years of partnership and impact on the ground.
See the appendix below for country context and the full list of 21 ECN partners with summaries of their work.
Appendix:
Brazil
Associação de Jovens Engajamundo will aim to reduce dropout rates in seven Brazilian states by addressing menstrual poverty — including lack of access to menstrual products and safe, clean toilet facilities — as a key education barrier. Student volunteers will train peers to understand their rights under existing menstrual dignity laws, then run school competitions where students themselves design solutions to implementation gaps. Winning proposals will go directly to policymakers.
Centro de Defesa da Criança e do Adolescente do Ceará (CEDECA-CE) will advocate for removing barriers to gender-inclusive education in Ceará state’s education plan while implementing pilot school inclusion plans in one urban and one Indigenous school — to support Black and Indigenous adolescent girls and those living in poverty to stay in school. They will train teachers on girls' rights, provide support for violence survivors and engage state officials to develop gender- and race-responsive policy commitments.
Grupo Curumim will push to make Brazil's School Health Program — addressing sexual health and violence in schools — a formal public policy. They will advocate to policymakers and monitor implementation across Pernambuco state's 184 municipalities. Workshops will train Black, quilombola and Indigenous girls in advocacy and leadership, equipping them to demand racial and gender equity through student councils and direct engagement with education policymakers.
Ethiopia
Center of Concern (CoC) will promote the Safe Schools Declaration, a global political commitment to ensure that schools remain safe places for students and educators during conflict, at federal and regional levels, in Ethiopia's conflict-affected Amhara region. They will build coalitions of community and government leaders, launch radio campaigns in three languages and train schools on preventing gender-based violence. Girls will petition officials for policy adoption. Community hackathons will co-design local solutions for violence prevention; water, sanitation and hygiene; and trauma healing to remove barriers keeping girls out of school.
Network of Ethiopian Women's Associations (NEWA) will push the Ethiopian government to formally adopt the Safe Schools Declaration. They will document safety risks girls face in conflict zones, then advocate to the Ministry of Education and Parliament using evidence-based reports and media campaigns. They will build a regional coalition to secure national endorsement, ensuring girls have safe learning environments during and after conflict.
Positive Action for Development (PAD) will advocate for Ethiopia to adopt the Safe Schools Declaration,. They will also train teachers, police and officials on preventing gender-based violence and coordinating services across education, health and protection sectors. They will run campaigns and community mobilization efforts using local media and girls-led advocacy to raise awareness and support for these policy changes. PAD will establish safe spaces and psychosocial support for at-risk girls in conflict-affected pastoralist communities while tracking progress of the adoption of the Declaration.
Nigeria
Aid for Rural Education Access Initiative (AREAi) will support Oyo state to develop guidelines ensuring education budgets address gender inequities. They aim to make education budgets transparent, accountable and aligned with girls' needs through collaborative citizen oversight. They will train officials on gender-responsive budgeting and create mobile apps and scorecards enabling communities, especially girls and parents, to track school spending. Data-driven media campaigns will expose misallocated funds.
Anti Sexual Violence Lead Support Initiative (ASVIOL) will support pregnant and married girls’ return to school in Kaduna state by training 75 mentors in trauma-informed care and inclusive teaching. Mentors will provide daily support using arts-based learning — drama, poetry, visual arts — to build girls' confidence. ASVIOL will create a best practices toolkit, then advocate the state’s Ministry of Education to integrate the mentorship model into official teacher training programmes statewide.
Black Girl’s Dream Initiative (BGDI) will launch EduTracka, an AI platform, to track education spending across Oyo state's 33 local governments. A traffic light system will flag underfunded areas affecting girls, comparing budgets against UNESCO benchmarks. The tool will map school infrastructure and include voice-to-text in local languages. BGDI will produce a three-year gender budget analysis with policy recommendations to ensure equitable funding for girls' education.
BudgIT Foundation for the Promotion of Information in Nigeria will advocate for gender-responsive education budgets at federal and state levels, mobilising 30 communities across six Nigerian states to re-enrol out-of-school girls. They will conduct research identifying investment gaps, simplify budget data into accessible digital campaigns and use its Tracka platform to monitor school projects. BudgIT will train school management committees to track local spending, infrastructure and teaching quality.
Center For Advocacy, Transparency and Accountability Initiative (CATAI) will strengthen its Education Budget Monitoring Advocacy Group in Adamawa state to track spending and advocate for increased girls' education funding. They will train the watchdog group and officials on gender-responsive budgeting, conduct annual budget analyses and facilitate quarterly meetings where advocates present evidence to influence the 2026 state budget. School management committees will monitor attendance and identify girls at risk of dropping out.
Isa Wali Empowerment Initiative (IWEI) will support girls affected by early marriage and pregnancy return to school in Kano state through transitional safe space hubs. These centres will provide 3,000 girls with accelerated literacy, life skills and vocational training. IWEI will run a parenting programme shifting family attitudes toward girls' education and train community accountability groups to challenge discrimination while engaging with state officials.
Participatory Communication for Gender Development (PAGED) Initiative will advocate for gender-responsive school re-entry pathways in Kano, Borno, and Kaduna states. They will train young women, including those who left school early, in filmmaking and research to document their experiences. Mobile cinema screenings in communities will challenge stigma around married girls returning to school. Town halls will connect young advocates with officials to address policy implementation gaps in Kaduna, Kano and Borno states.
Teenage Education and Empowerment Network will advocate for married girls and young mothers to re-enter school in Kaduna state. They will produce a report on the costs of keeping girls out of school, launch a three-month radio drama and train 30 girls in advocacy. They will then work with students, parents, religious leaders and teachers to develop comprehensive school re-entry guidelines for the state.
Women, Children, Youth Health and Education Initiative (WCY) will enforce child marriage protections and school re-entry for pregnant girls and young mothers in Bauchi state. They will advocate to officials on the Child Rights Law, train teachers and health workers to support young mothers without discrimination and run media campaigns reducing stigma. WCY will establish safe spaces with alternative learning programmes and create community monitoring systems tracking school retention rates for young mothers.
Pakistan
Mountain Institute for Educational Development (MIED) will support recovery of flood-damaged schools and address infrastructure gaps in remote Diamer district, Gilgit-Baltistan, while advocating for girls' education as essential social protection against child marriage and other vulnerabilities. They will provide essential missing furniture, learning materials and hire female teachers to eliminate hidden school costs. They will train school management committees to monitor spending and identify resource needs for government budgets.
Rural Empowerment & Institutional Development (REPID) will advocate for gender-responsive education budgets in Umerkot and Khairpur districts, rural Sindh. They will conduct annual budget audits exposing funding gaps, then mobilise communities to pressure officials. They will pilot public-private partnerships covering uniforms, transport and learning materials in 70 schools to eliminate hidden costs for families. Community education monitoring committees will track fee violations and teacher absenteeism through hotlines, strengthening accountability.
Tanzania
Children’s Dignity Forum (CDF) will advocate to set the minimum marriage age to 18 without exceptions. They will convene government ministries for coordinated child marriage prevention and lead the 103-member Tanzania Ending Child Marriage Network. In Mpwapwa district, Dodoma, they will train teachers to identify gender-based violence, strengthen school reporting mechanisms and run parent sessions engaging men and boys as allies in protecting girls' rights.
Msichana Initiative Organisation will strengthen Tanzania's 2021 school re-entry policy implementation for young mothers in Dodoma and Tabora. They will train school officials and establish teacher networks sharing best practices. Fifteen girl champions will serve as peer role models. Msichana Initiative will provide 150 adolescent mothers with supplies and psychosocial support, run mentorship sessions, offer vocational training during holidays and launch community forums challenging stigma around young mothers attending school.
Tanzania Education Network/Mtandao wa Elimu Tanzania (TEN/MET) will advocate for provisions guaranteeing young mothers' right to re-enrol in school under Tanzania's Education Act. They will push for gender-responsive budgets and nationwide rollout of the Dropout Early Warning System identifying at-risk girls. They will train district officers and headteachers on re-entry implementation in Dodoma, Tabora and Lindi, and launch digital storytelling campaigns featuring testimonials from re-enrolled students, teachers and community leaders.
Transforming Life will help young mothers return to school in Longido district, Arusha, providing transport, health care linkages and counseling. They will run community forums with local and religious leaders shifting harmful norms and train teachers on gender-sensitive practices.