Ann Lesley Cotton
OBE (born 1950) is a
Welsh
Welsh may refer to:
Related to Wales
* Welsh, referring or related to Wales
* Welsh language, a Brittonic Celtic language spoken in Wales
* Welsh people
People
* Welsh (surname)
* Sometimes used as a synonym for the ancient Britons (Celtic peop ...
entrepreneur and philanthropist who was awarded an
Order of the British Empire (OBE) in the
2006 Queen's New Year Honours List. The honour was in recognition of her services to
education of young women
Female education is a catch-all term of a complex set of issues and debates surrounding education ( primary education, secondary education, tertiary education, and health education in particular) for girls and women. It is frequently called girl ...
in rural Africa as the founder of
Camfed
Camfed (also known as the Campaign for Female Education) is an international non-governmental, non-profit organization founded in 1993 whose mission is to eradicate poverty in Africa through the education of girls and the empowerment of young wo ...
.
Camfed ''Innovation and Activities''
Camfed's goal is to replace the existing cycle of poverty and inequality with a new cycle of empowerment and opportunity. The organisation's unique approach is to not only support girls and young women through school, but also on to new lives as entrepreneurs and community leaders. To complete the "virtuous cycle",
graduating students become CAMA alumnae, many of whom return to school to train and mentor new generations of students. Camfed started out by supporting 32 girls through school in Zimbabwe in 1993. Since then it has expanded its success across 2,295 communities in five sub-Saharan countries. Over the past 17 years, 1,065,710 young people directly benefited from Camfed’s programmes in Ghana, Malawi, Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe. More than 3 million children have already benefited from Camfed's programmes in a network of 5,085 partner school
Camfed won the International Aid and Development Charity of the Year award in 2003. In 2014, Camfed was recognised by the
Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development
The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD; french: Organisation de coopération et de développement économiques, ''OCDE'') is an intergovernmental organization, intergovernmental organisation with 38 member countries ...
(OECD) for best practice in taking development innovation to scale.
Background
Cotton was born in
Cardiff
Cardiff (; cy, Caerdydd ) is the capital and largest city of Wales. It forms a principal area, officially known as the City and County of Cardiff ( cy, Dinas a Sir Caerdydd, links=no), and the city is the eleventh-largest in the United Kingd ...
, Wales, and was educated at
Howell's School, Llandaff
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, motto = Nurturing Excellence
, established = 1860
, closed =
, type = Independent day school
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.
For more than three decades, Ann Cotton has been focused on improving opportunity for children at the margins of education. She began her career in a London school by establishing one of the first centres for girls excluded from mainstream education.
Cotton's commitment to girls' education in Africa began in 1991, when she went on a research trip to Zimbabwe to investigate why girls' school enrolment in rural areas was so low. Contrary to the common assumption that families weren't sending girls to school for cultural reasons, Cotton discovered that poverty was the main roadblock. Families could not afford to buy books or pay school fees for all their children. Instead, they had to choose which children would receive an education. Since boys had a better chance of getting a paid job after graduation, daughters were rarely selected.
Cotton knew that educated girls were less likely to contract
HIV/AIDS
Human immunodeficiency virus infection and acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (HIV/AIDS) is a spectrum of conditions caused by infection with the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), a retrovirus. Following initial infection an individual ...
, would marry later, have fewer and healthier children, and would support the next generation to go to school. She understood that poverty and exclusion affects girls both psychologically and economically, and that if girls could be educated, supported by their communities, and empowered to shape their own destinies, they could change their communities and nations forever.
In 1993, after
grassroots fundraising
Grassroots fundraising is a common fundraising method used by political candidates which has grown in popularity with the emergence of the Internet. It has been utilized by US presidential candidates like Howard Dean, Barack Obama, Ron Paul, and mo ...
that supported the first 32 girls through school in Zimbabwe, Cotton founded Camfed. The reach of the organisation's innovative education programmes has grown ever since. In 2013 alone, Camfed directly supported more than 434,000 children to go to school.
One of the most effective and innovative results of Camfed's work is CAMA, a unique, 24,436-member-strong pan-African network of Camfed graduates. CAMA alumnae use their experience and expertise to design and deliver extended programs to students and communities, including health and financial literacy training. Each CAMA member supports the education of another two to three children outside of her own family, multiplying the benefits of her education, and testifying to the programs' effectiveness and sustainability. Over Camfed's two decades, this approach has been proven to work both within rural communities and at a larger scale across countries.
Residencies, platforms and awards
Ann Cotton is an Honorary Fellow at
Homerton College
Homerton College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge. Its first premises were acquired in Homerton, London in 1768, by an informal gathering of Protestant dissenters with origins in the seventeenth century. In 1894, the co ...
, Cambridge, and Social Entrepreneur in Residence at the
Cambridge University Judge Business School.
She is a noted speaker on international platforms, including the
World Economic Forum
The World Economic Forum (WEF) is an international non-governmental and lobbying organisation based in Cologny, canton of Geneva, Switzerland. It was founded on 24 January 1971 by German engineer and economist Klaus Schwab. The foundation, ...
, the
Clinton Global Initiative
The Clinton Foundation (founded in 2001 as the William J. Clinton Presidential Foundation, and renamed in 2013 as the Bill, Hillary & Chelsea Clinton Foundation) is a nonprofit organization under section 501(c)(3) of the U.S. tax code. It was es ...
and the
Skoll World Forum
The Skoll Foundation is a private foundation based in Palo Alto, California. The foundation makes grants and investments intended to reduce global poverty. Jeffrey Skoll created the foundation in 1999.
The total assets of the foundation (includ ...
. In 2014 she addressed the US-Africa Summit hosted by
The White House
The White House is the official residence and workplace of the president of the United States. It is located at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW in Washington, D.C., and has been the residence of every U.S. president since John Adams in 1800. ...
,
George W. Bush Institute
The George W. Bush Presidential Center, which opened on April 25, 2013, is a complex that includes former United States President George W. Bush's Presidential library system, presidential library and museum, the George W. Bush Policy Institute, ...
and
US State Department
The United States Department of State (DOS), or State Department, is an executive department of the U.S. federal government responsible for the country's foreign policy and relations. Equivalent to the ministry of foreign affairs of other nati ...
.
Cotton has won numerous awards for her work, including an Honorary Doctorate in Law from
Cambridge University
, mottoeng = Literal: From here, light and sacred draughts.
Non literal: From this place, we gain enlightenment and precious knowledge.
, established =
, other_name = The Chancellor, Masters and Schola ...
; an
OBE in 2006 in honour of her advocacy of girls' education in Africa; the Skoll Award for Social Entrepreneurship;
Woman of the Year in the UK; and UK Social Entrepreneur of the Year. In November 2014, Ann was awarded the
WISE Prize for Education,
[Brown, Sarah]
"Sarah Brown pays tribute to WISE Prize winner - Camfed founder Ann Cotton"
Watt, Ewan
"Ann Cotton dedicates WISE Prize to one million girls Camfed will help educate in next five years"
Theirworld, 4 November 2014. becoming the fourth WISE laureate alongside
Vicky Colbert
Vicky Colbert (born Clara Victoria Colbert de Arboleda; 1948/1949) is a Colombian social entrepreneur.
She has served as Colombia's Vice-Minister of Education, and is the founder and current Executive Director of Escuela Nueva Foundation. She has ...
, founder of
Escuela Nueva Escuela Nueva (Spanish for "new school") is an education model that emphasizes understanding over memorization and development of interpersonal skills. It originated in Colombia.
In an Escuela Nueva school, students learn independently, at their ...
in Colombia, Dr
Madhav Chavan
Madhav Chavan (born 1954) is a social activist and entrepreneur. He is the co-founder and CEO of the educational non-profit, Pratham. He also started the Read India campaign, which aims to teach basic reading, writing and arithmetic to underpr ...
, co-founder of Pratham in India, and Sir
Fazle Hasan Abed
Sir Fazle Hasan Abed ( bn, ফজলে হাসান আবেদ; 27 April 1936 – 20 December 2019) was the founder of BRAC, one of the world's largest non-governmental organizations.
Early life
Abed was born on 27 April 1936 in the vi ...
, founder of
BRAC in Bangladesh.
References
External links
Camfed International"Investments Announced at Symposium for African Spouses" The White House, 6 August 2014.
*Ann at the opening plenary of th
Skoll World Forum 2010Skoll World Forum: From Poverty to ProsperitySkoll World Forum: Camfed
*Devin Thorpe
"How Many Girls Can One Woman Teach? You'd Be Surprised" ''
Forbes
''Forbes'' () is an American business magazine owned by Integrated Whale Media Investments and the Forbes family. Published eight times a year, it features articles on finance, industry, investing, and marketing topics. ''Forbes'' also re ...
'', 16 September 2014.
"Camfed Announces Major New Partnerships at the Clinton Global Initiative Annual Meeting" Ghana: Newsline,
United Nations Girls' Education Initiative
The United Nations Girls' Education Initiative (UNGEI) is an initiative launched by the United Nations in 2000 at the World Education Forum in Dakar at the primary school Ndiarème B. It aims to reduce the gap in schooling for girls and to giv ...
.
"Camfed and The MasterCard Foundation Launch Groundbreaking Partnership in Ghana to Enable Young Women to Own their Futures"Ann Cotton on KNTV
{{DEFAULTSORT:Cotton, Ann
British philanthropists
1950 births
Living people
People from Cardiff
Social entrepreneurs