Actress and humanitarian Angelina Jolie introduced the audience at last week’s Women in the World Summit to very personal stories about Malala Yousafzai, the Pakistani teenager who was shot in the head by the Taliban who stopped her school bus and asked which of the girls was the blogger Malala.

Vital Voices, with a donation from the Women in the World Foundation, established the Malala Fund, to be directed by the 15-year-old. Malala announced the first grant to educate 40 girls in her home district in the Swat Valley.

After Jolie, who is the special enjoy to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, left the stage, conference organizer Tina Brown announced that the actress had recently donated $200,000 to the fund. Jolie has started her own project to fund girls’ schools in particular, with proceeds from her jewelry collection Style by Jolie jewelry collaboration with Robert Procop.

1. 25-year-old US diplomat Anne Smedinghoff died in an attack in Afghanistan on Saturday. The young diplomat had volunteered to deliver books to a school in southern Afghanistan.

US Secretary of State John Kerry met Smedinghoff on his recent trip to Afghanistan and spoke of her today.

“The folks who want to kill people, and that’s all they want to do, are scared of knowledge. And they want to shut the doors and they don’t want people to make their choices about the future. For them, it’s ‘You do things my way and if you don’t, we’ll throw acid in your face. We’ll put a bullet in your face,’ to a young girl trying to learn,” Kerry said. “So this is a huge challenge for us. It is a confrontation with modernity, with possibilities, and everything that our country stands for, everything we stand for, is embodied in what Anne Smedinghoff stood for.”

The young diplomat graduated from John Hopkins University in 2009 with a degree in international relations. She joined the Foreign Service shortly afterward. via CNN

2. In another piece of great news for girls, Madonna is set to sell her painting ‘Trois Femmes à la Table Rouge’, a 1921 painting by Fernand Léger at Sotheby’s in New York on May 7th. Proceeds from the sale estimated to fetch $5-$7 million will be used for girls’ education.

“I have a great passion for art and a great passion for education,’’ she said in a statement announcing the sale. “In conjunction with Sotheby’s I would like to share these two passions,’’ adding that “I cannot accept a world where women or girls are wounded, shot or killed for either going to school or teaching in girls’ schools.’’

Indeed, girls’ education is the topic on everyone’s minds and the subject of the last panel on Thursday evening at the Women in the World Conference. Moderated by Christiane Amanpour, the panelists were Humaira Bachal, founder of theDream Foundation Trust, Khalida Brohi, founder of the Sughar Women Program, and Sharmeen Obaid Chinoy, CEO of SOC Films.

3. A US Federal judge ruled on Friday that emergency contraceptives such as Plan B and Next Choice should be available to all, including minors.

In a sharply worded ruling that called government regulators “politically motivated and scientifically unjustified,” U.S. District Judge Edward Korman ruled that levonorgestrel-based contraceptives such as Plan B One-Step and Next Choice One Dose should be available over the counter to all customers within 30 days.

“There is no serious health risk associated with use of Plan B as prescribed and intended, much less one that would make restrictions on distribution necessary for its safe use,” Korman wrote.

“A federal judge has accomplished what two administrations failed to do: make a decision about access to a drug based on medical evidence,” said Michael Halpern, program manager at the Center for Science and Democracy at the Union of Concerned Scientists. via LA Times

4. In Kansas, papers filed in court by the US Department of Justice reveal as assertion that domestic terrorist Angel Dillard asked a prison inmate to firebomb the house of Dr Mila Means, an abortion provider who stepped into abortion care in Wichita, Kansas after the assassination of Dr. George Tiller.

The Department of Justice sued Dillard — who claims that God speaks to her, guiding her actions — for sending an allegedly threatening letter to Dr. Means.

Of note in the RHReality Check article, is the news that anti-choice terrorists are increasingly claiming the “god defense” when arguing their cases. Dr. Tillard’s killer Scott Roeder says his actions were motivated by God.

Dillard claims that her conversations with both Roeder and inmate Robert Campbell are shielded from disclosure under “priest-penitent” privilege. A judge has ruled the communications are not protected since she is not ordained clergy. The defense has appealed.

5. US Women — especially working mothers — have little social policy backup, compared to women in other developed countries. But those who survive the challenges of career and motherhood appear to achieve significantly greater gender parity as managers, compared to women in other countries .

View chart large.

In separate data from the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, the US has the smallest gap between women and men in senior management positions, as of 2008. 16% of men managers have senior positions versus 14% for women.

Writing for the New York Times Economix blog, Catherine Rampell has a major magazine feature ‘Lean In, Dad: How Shared Diaper Duty Could Stimulate the Economy.’

Madonna is selling ‘Trois Femmes à la Table Rouge’, a 1921 painting by Fernand Léger at Sotheby’s in New York on May 7. Proceeds from the sale estimated to fetch $5-$7 million will be used for girls’ education.