A STUDENT from Coleg Gwent has won a high-profile award for her work raising awareness of female genital mutilation (FGM) and forced child marriage.

Sheila Jerome is studying Children’s Care, Learning and Development at Coleg Gwent’s City of Newport campus.

Drawing on her own experiences, she has also made it her life's mission to spread the word about how FGM and child marriage exists in some UK communities while encouraging women to speak out.

This month, the 27-year-old was recognised with the Ethnic Minority Welsh Women Achievement Association Award (EMWWAA) under the ‘Violence Against Women’ agenda.

Sheila left her native Nigeria four years ago, and travelled to the UK on a student visa, leaving her 8-month-old daughter back in Nigeria in the care of her mother.

It was only when Sheila and her husband arrived in the UK that she realised that the personal experiences she had undergone in her own community back in Nigeria were abusive.

She had been forced into marriage at the age of eight, and underwent FGM when she was a baby – practices that were seen as perfectly normal in her native community.

When Sheila explained to the police and social services what had happened to her as a child, it became clear that her own daughter was at risk of becoming a victim of exactly the same thing, so Sheila arranged for her daughter to join her in Wales.

Now, with a young son and another baby daughter, Sheila has had to claim asylum in order to protect her two daughters, which means that she can never return to her community in Nigeria again.

“FGM and child marriage are so threatening to women and children’s health and wellbeing but many people of ethnic minorities are unaware of their dangers”, said Ms Jerome.

“Women like me are sitting in their homes, dying in silence. I need to get the message out there to other women and girls who are at risk of this happening to them in their own communities.

“We must find a solution to stop this happening but we can only do that by speaking out together.

"It was only when I started to speak out about my own personal experiences that I gained the confidence to realise how wrong they were”.

The EMWWAA awards, now in their fourth year, celebrate the achievements of Black and Asian minority ethnic women and girls living in Wales, by recognising their contribution to welsh life, and identifying them as role models not just for their communities but also for women as a whole.

Following the award win, Sheila is applying for scholarships to study childhood studies at either Cardiff or Bristol University.

She also attends events and conferences and is currently writing an essay about the issue that she wants to share with other ethnic minority women and communities.

She added: “My life experiences have been difficult but they have motivated me to get involved in the community and urge women to stand up for themselves and seek the help they need”.