Sarah Brown has been honoured at a charity’s Woman of Influence awards for her campaign work to educate more children around the world.

Action for Children recognised Mrs Brown for her work with Theirworld, a charity she founded and now acts as chair of which aims to give children the best start in life.

Theirworld also administers the Jennifer Brown Research Fund – established in the memory of her first child with husband Gordon.

The shortlist for the award also featured Yvonne Greaves, head of Women in Business at NatWest and Royal Bank of Scotland & Ulster Bank; Sharon Moore MBE, CTO of Government at IBM; and Corinne Hutton.

Held at Glasgow’s Grand Central Hotel this year, the event has raised more than £1 million to support the charity’s work in Scotland.

Mrs Brown said: “I am so grateful to Action For Children Scotland for this honour and I promise to continue campaigning and fighting for girls and women and young people here and across the world.

“All children deserve the right to realise their potential and to look forward to a brighter future. It is deeply frustrating to realise that 600 million of them are denied the chance of an education and skills for future work and life chances. Not only does each child miss out but the world misses out on so much talent.

“If we could give to every girl in the world we would go a long way to addressing gender stereotyping and gender equality.

“Girls miss out on school when they are kept at home to look after young children and help with domestic chores or when they are needed to work to bring funds in for the family or when they are married off at a young age.

“Around 12 million girls are married each year and the tragedy is that in somewhere such as sub-Saharan Africa, we know that for each year a girl stays at school her future income rises by 10%.

“Educating girls gives us hope.”

Sarah Brown
Sarah Brown was recognised for her work with Theirworld (Martin Shields/PA)

Dr Holly Butler, a research scientist at the University of Strathclyde, won the Woman to Watch award.

The annual event also recognised a young carer from North Lanarkshire, 17-year-old Megan Boss from Coatbridge, with the Inspirational Young Woman award.

She cares for both of her parents and received little support before being involved in Action for Children.

Paul Carberry, Action for Children director for Scotland, said: “I am very happy that Megan has been recognised for all her efforts with the Inspirational Young Woman award.

“We are incredibly proud to see how far she has come during her time at the project and to see her now act as an ambassador supporting other young carers, both in her school and across North Lanarkshire.”