9-year-old Aayat mesmerises world with her talents

Faatiha Aayat, a nine-year-old Bangladeshi girl living in the US, has made a special place in the hearts of millions of people across the globe through her activism regarding climate change, child rights, health, information, learning and development.

As a child rights activist and climate campaigner, she has been promoting Bangladesh before the global community through social media platforms, such as YouTube and Facebook, as well as taking part in international programmes.

Born on October 13, 2011 at Dhaka’s Uttara, Aayat left for the United States with her parents at the age of four and is now a fifth grader at the Gifted and Talented Program of New York City Department of Education.

“I present Math, Science, Coding, World News, Storytelling, Qur’an, Hadith, Tafseer and Recitation videos in my social media to make sure that access to knowledge becomes without stress and pressure. My motto is “Education is Fun, Play to Learn.” I regularly speak for disadvantaged children in different parts around the world who do not have food, education, shelter and sometimes even family,” Aayat told The Business Post.

Aayat has been actively vocal against child abuse, gender discrimination and domestic violence.

She spoke on global warming and climate change and its effect on refugee children at the International Youth Day Conference 2019 in the United Nations Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) Chamber.

Prior to that, she delivered a speech on the digital future of development at the 74th United Nations General Assembly. Besides, she also spoke on access to education for underprivileged children at 1st Annual Harvard Undergraduate UNICEF Club Conference.

Already a certified Android & IOS App developer, the fifth grader is currently learning JavaScript and HTML and plans to launch her own app very soon.

Sharing her experiences with The Business Post, Aayat said her biggest inspiration was from her parents.

“I spend my leisure time for academic studies, reading books, learning coding, memorizing the Holy Qur’an and reading Hadith and Tafseer, news, paintings & drawing and even for creating digital contents for my social media platforms,” she added.

Apart from numerous speeches, interviews, awards, recognition, participation and acknowledgement, Aayat has won several awards in Mathematics, Science and Art competitions.

She won the first prize in the regional round of National Math League 2019 in New York, and also participated in Perennial Math Tournament 2019 in Atlanta, JEI Math Olympiad 2019 in New York, National Math Festival 2019 in Washington, Global Math Week 2017 in New York.

Meanwhile, she has already published three books – Diary of a Muslim Kid, Bear with a Bear, Sisters’ Reunion – and some of her new books will be published soon. “In terms of career, my thought is to serve humanity regardless of the profession I take. I would be pleased to find that people are being benefited from whatever service I may offer. For example, if I become an engineer, my goal would be to add an extra value into it by making this earth more liveable and greener. If I become a teacher, my objective would be to improve the intensity of teaching so that humanity can have some extra knowledge,” she said while explaining her future plans.