ZAATARI REFUGEE CAMP, Jordan — Omaima Hoshan, 14, wasn’t really aware of early marriage until her best friend dropped out of school in the fifth grade. Omaima was very concerned. Her friend was an excellent student — the best in their class — and had always dreamed about becoming a doctor, so why would she leave school? Omaima learned from the teacher that her friend had married her 18-year-old cousin under pressure from her father. The girl hadn’t even turned 13 yet. Omaima never saw her again.

From that day, Omaima noticed more girls leaving school as young as 12, 13 or 14 years old. She remembered thinking it was totally wrong. They were just children, like her. She talked about it with her father, Thaer Hoshan, who had studied law back in Syria.

“He told me that I should speak up if something is wrong and encouraged me to talk to the girls about this subject in order to discourage the practice,” Omaima told Al-Monitor in Jordan’s Zaatari refugee camp, where she has lived with her parents and four brothers since they fled Syria in 2012.

Encouraged by her parents and inspired by Nobel Peace Prize winner Malala Yousafzai — she read her biography — Omaima, who will turn 15 in March, started campaigning against child marriage. First she spoke to her classmates and encouraged them to talk to their parents about it, and later she organized events such as art classes and drama workshops about the risks of early marriage for girls and their mothers in the camp. To do all this, Omaima works together with a child-protection group in the camp run by Save the Children.