Ann Lesley Cotton (born 1950 in Cardiff) is an 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 in rural Africa as the founder of CAMFED.
Young people and education have been the focus of Ann Cotton’s life and she has a passionate belief in the power of education to transform lives. In her early career, she established and led an education center for girls excluded from mainstream education in London. Ann went on to work as an Educational Assessor and advocate for children in care in Lancashire, UK. Whilst at Boston University in the US, she studied the multi-cultural education system of Massachusetts before returning to the UK to study Human Rights & Education at the London Institute of Education.
In 1992, Ann Cotton traveled to rural Zimbabwe to investigate why girls' access to education in rural areas was so low. What she found surprised her. Contrary to the broadly-held notion that cultural resistance was the main reason so few girls were going to school, Ann discovered that family poverty was a more significant constraining factor. Could an economic solution unlock opportunities for addressing the widespread exclusion of girls from education? Could it lead to economic, social and cultural benefits for rural Africa?
In 1993, Ann started the Campaign for Female Education (CAMFED) by fund-raising at her kitchen table and the first 32 girls were supported into school in two of the most impoverished districts of Zimbabwe. The high attendance and retention rates of supported girls quickly proved parents’ commitment to their daughters’ education when direct costs were met. This is a pattern that has since been repeated in hundreds of communities in Zimbabwe, Zambia, Ghana and Tanzania.
As the first group of girls supported by CAMFED was due to complete secondary education, there was an urgent need to create post-school economic opportunities in their communities. Without such opportunities, educated young women would migrate to the cities and become vulnerable to economic and sexual exploitation and moreover, take the benefits of their education away from their rural communities. Against this background, the Camfed Alumni (Cama) was established in 1998 to connect young female school leavers and offer post-secondary school training opportunities, most crucially, in owning and managing money. Cama provides a structure through which its members can develop their activism and leadership to achieve positive social change. Today, Cama has a membership of almost 5,000 with structures that extend from village to district, national and pan-African levels and is one demonstration of the sustainability and efficacy of Camfed’s work.
In 2000 Ann went on to study at the School for Social Entrepreneurs. She has an MA in Human Rights and Education, is an honorary Master of the Open University, sits on the Board of the African Studies Centre and is an Entrepreneur in Residence at Cambridge University. In 2004 Ann was named UK Social Entrepreneur of the Year, and in 2005 was awarded both the Skoll Award for Social Entrepreneurship and a Beacon Fellowship. In 2006, Ann received an OBE in honor of her services to girls’ education in Africa and in 2007 she was awarded an honorary doctorate from the University of Cambridge.
In addition to being the recipient of the Order of the British Empire award, Cotton has received several other awards including: