A poised, passionate education advocate from Pakistan spoke to American audiences last week with an unusual impact for a 16-year-old. Malala Yousafzai, who is the subject of a new book titled “I Am Malala,” was at the United Nations in New York, the Oval Office at the White House and the World Bank in Washington. As a crusader for education for all girls and boys in Pakistan and elsewhere, she also visited Boston and gave numerous interviews, including one on “The Daily Show” with Jon Stewart that left him speechless at one point.

She had attracted attention – positive and negative – at home with a blog for the British Broadcasting Corp. that criticized the exclusion of many girls from school after primary grades. One year ago this month, a college-age gunman from the Taliban (a strict political movement) boarded a school bus, asked “Who is Malala?” and opened fire. She and two other girls were injured. That day, she said at the UN, “strength, power and courage were born."

She and her family moved to the United Kingdom for safety and Malala began gaining international attention. A British author worked with her and wrote the new book. Some journalists and supporters even speculated that she might win the Nobel Peace Prize last week. This is the message she shared at last week’s series of events, speaking in English with an adult-like polish: "Education is not Eastern, neither Western. Education is everything. . . . Education is every child's right."

Malala says: “We know that terrorists are afraid of the power of education.”

U.S. First Lady says: "Investing in girls' education is the very best thing we can do -- not just for our daughters and granddaughters, but for their families, their communities and their countries." -- Michelle Obama

Admirer says: ”Her powerful words resonated with people around the world, with girls and boys, men and women. A new voice for gender equality was born.” -- S. Allen Counter, director of the Harvard Foundation in Cambridge, Mass., which gave her an award last month