15 Years of Changing the World, One Child at a Time
Over the past 15 years, we have funded the projects of 95 remarkable people serving vulnerable children in 148 countries. Each Honoree has their own inspiring story to tell; each has made a visible impact on the lives of children around the world.
This year’s six Award winners have made extraordinary contributions to improving the lives of children around the world. In just a few days, our 2012 Honorees will join the World of Children in New York City for our 15th Annual Award Ceremony. There, they will be honored with our Award – recognized by the media as the “Nobel Prize for Child Advocates” – for their extraordinary dedication to children in need.
“[Our Honorees] did not and do not take the easy way,” said Harry Leibowitz, our co-founder. “They reach out, every day, taking one child’s hand at a time — one tiny hand in theirs — and lead them down a new path that they are blazing. Where there’s hope that tomorrow may be a little better than today.”
To learn more about this event, please visit our Awards Ceremony page.
Meet our 2012 Award Recipients:
Dr. Nilas Young
2012 Health Award Honoree
Dr. Young provides life-saving cardiac surgery to infants and children in Russia through his organization, Heart to Heart International Children’s Medical Alliance, and has saved the lives of more than 13,000 children. Dr. Young is using our grant funds to train aspiring physicians in state-of-the-art centers in the U.S., giving them the knowledge to enhance their care of children with heart defects in their own communities.
Benoît Duchâteau-Arminjon
2012 Humanitarian Award Honoree
Moved by a year-long volunteer experience, Benoît created Krousar Thmey (“New Family”), a nonprofit that supports disadvantaged children in Cambodia. Today, his staff of over 400 people helps over 4,000 children annually. Benoît is using our grant award to ensure that children in Krousar Thmey’s programs have the educational and hygienic materials they need to go to school, and stay in school.
Dallas Jessup
2012 Youth Award Honoree
After watching video footage on the news of a teenage girl being abducted, Dallas – a black belt martial artist – developed a video to teach girls how to stay safe and fight back against an attacker. The film has grown into Just Yell Fire, an organization that offers training and free, instructional videos for girls in 64 countries. Dallas will use our grant funds to give girls the power to fight back by implementing self-defense programming in schools and shelters around the world.
Kyle Weiss
2012 Youth Award Winner
Kyle founded FUNDaFIELD to build soccer fields for children living in regions that have experienced extreme conflict. Once child soldiers, victims of natural disaster, war or disease, the young people who play soccer on Kyle’s fields have shown incredible improvements, both physical and emotional. Kyle will use our grant funds to help children living in these devastated communities begin the healing process through the therapeutic benefits of sport.
Craig Kielburger
15th Anniversary Award Recognition
In 2002, we honored Craig with our first Youth Award for founding Free The Children to fight against child labor in third-world countries. We will honor Craig again for leading what has become the largest youth empowerment organization in the world, having impacted the lives of more than 1 million young people. Craig will use our grant award to benefit the community of Sikrar – a small village in Kenya – by improving their school’s educational infrastructure, building a school garden and funding a mobile health clinic.
Alina Cho
2012 Board of Governors’ Award
The World of Children will also honor Alina with a non-monetary World of Children Board of Governors’ Award for her exemplary leadership and advocacy of philanthropic efforts serving children. A national correspondent for CNN, Alina has received an honorary doctorate for her contributions to journalism and is one of only a handful of journalists invited to report live from North Korea. She has served as our Master of Ceremonies at our Annual Awards Ceremonies for the past four years and has served our Advisory Council since its formation in 2011.