Editor’s Note: On September 21, 2024, in New York City, more than 50 young women from around the world – including the youngest Nobel Prize Laureate Malala Yousafzai – gathered to take United Nations member states to task for failing to prioritize girls and young women in the planning and content of the upcoming Summit of the Future. 

At a demonstration in front of the UN, surrounded by life-size cutouts of world leaders dressed ironically as youthful “girl experts”, the activists delivered a strong message: world leaders aren’t the experts on what girls want and need for their futures – girls are. 

The group is backed by an informal coalition of girl-centered non-profit organizations, institutions, networks, and funds who worked to synthesize the well-documented policy, programming, and resourcing demands of girls at WhatGirlsWant.com

Serena Abrahams, a Girls Activist Fellow, spoke at the demonstration:

They say the pen is mightier than the sword, 

so you write promises and say you'll keep them.

You say you'll change something, but rome wasn't built in a day.

You say knowledge is power, and you know you're right.

You've said plenty.

Now, it is time for you to listen.

I put my pen to paper, and I think of those who should do the same,

Girls who need their own pen,

to fight oh so many swords, and I write

for everyone who has yet to grasp a pen and a voice,

for a we that is everywhere, 

bright enough you have to shield your eyes,

with voices fierce and fast on paper to finally open your gate.

So what girls want is here and now, 

and you should be telling us just how you plan to lead us 

out of the twisted wood, but the world won't have to wait,

for if we could, 

we would write our own endings, 

if only you'd let us speak, 

and when we speak, we will shout 

and look out,

because maybe i am only thirteen, 

and I don't matter to the world,

but the world matters to me,

and my pen still triumphs over any sword,

and I am here,

and we are here,

with demands that will not be denied,

so you'd better start listening to our pens.