Marcus Rashford has had an extremely noteworthy and successful 2020, which has culminated in the Manchester United star being honored by the BBC as part of its Sports Personality of the Year awards.
Rashford was awarded the Expert Panel Special Award for his fight against child food poverty in the United Kingdom. Rashford, who recently revealed his family often did not have enough to eat when he was growing up, successfully campaigned for the UK government to extend free school meals during the Covid-19 pandemic.
His campaigning resulted in 1.3 million children in England being able to claim free school meal vouchers during the summer holidays and put pressure on the government to change policy that ultimately saw more than £400 million pledged to support poor children and their families.
In addition to his campaigning and own fundraising, Rashford has set up a book club for children, in part to enjoy the escapism of reading.
The Expert Panel Special Award was created especially to honor Rashford’s incredible social projects, as the BBC’s other awards and based purely on sporting achievement.
Today, BBC One will air a documentary — Marcus Rashford: Feeding Britain’s Children — that goes behind the scenes of Rashford’s free meals campaign.
Rashford was also announced as the face of Burberry’s new collection and global campaign, and a mural of the Manchester United striker was unveiled in Manchester last week.
