One In a Million wins Shine Global’s 2026 Children’s Resilience Award for Documentary at Sheffield DocFest; Stalin Boys wins Award for Short Doc

June 15, 2026, Sheffield, UK – Shine Global is proud to announce that One In a Million, directed by Itab Azzam and Jack MacInnes, has won the Shine Global Children’s Resilience Award for Documentary at the 2026 Sheffield DocFest, the UK’s leading documentary festival and one of the world’s most influential markets for documentary projects. In addition, the short documentary Stalin Boys, directed by Bianca Giaever and Ora DeKornfeld, has been awarded the Children’s Resilience Award for Short Documentary.

The Shine Global Children’s Resilience Awards for Documentary recognize films that celebrate the strength and power of children in the face of adversity. Presented for the second year in partnership with Sheffield DocFest, the award honors documentary storytelling that expands understanding of children’s experiences around the world and the courage they show in confronting extraordinary challenges.

Filmed over the course of ten years, One In a Million follows 11-year-old Isra’a and her family as they flee war in Syria and attempt to rebuild their lives in Germany. As they navigate war, exile, displacement, and belonging, viewers see the long term costs of displacement and the complexities of the refugee experience.

“One In a Million is an incredible feat of documentary filmmaking,”said Alexandra Blaney, Co-CEO and Creative Director of Shine Global. “Through Isra’a’s decade-long journey, the film allows us to look beyond headlines and statistics and witness the long-term emotional realities of displacement. We are honored to recognize Itab Azzam, Jack MacInnes, and the entire filmmaking team for a work that so powerfully reflects the spirit of the Children’s Resilience Award.”

One In a Million made its world premiere at the Sundance Film Festival in January where it won both the Directing Award and Audience Award in the World Documentary Competition. The film is directed by Itab Azzam and Jack MacInnes and produced by Will Anderson, James Bluemel, Andrew Palmer, and Raney Aronson-Rath. Production companies: Frontline Features, BBC Storyville and KEO Films in association with Placeholder Films, New Lane Media, Impact Partners.

In the charming short documentary Stalin Boys, four middle school boys in a tiny Texas border town channel an unlikely obsession with Joseph Stalin into a history fair play about tyranny. Filmed in Marathon, Texas where the middle school has just 11 students, the film adroitly balances humor against the serious subject matter, as the boys explore their thoughts about bullying and their own power. The film is produced by Alejandra Vasquez, Sam Osborn, Ora DeKornfeld, and Bianca Giaever with New York Times OpDocs, and previously won both an audience award and a special jury award at SxSW.

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ABOUT SHINE GLOBAL
Shine Global is a non-profit media company that improves the lives of children by telling powerful stories to raise awareness, promote action, and inspire change. We produce inspiring films and compelling content about underserved children. Through tailored distribution and outreach, we connect with our audiences in communities, classrooms, museums, and on Capitol Hill as part of a powerful engagement campaign to encourage social change.

Since our founding in 2005, Shine Global films have won more than 100 major awards, including an Academy Award® for Best Documentary Short Subject for Inocente and an Academy Award®-nomination and two Emmys® for War/Dance, and an Academy Award®-nomination for Anuja. Recent films include the documentary-animation hybrid Liyana, the hit documentary The Eagle Huntress, Through Our Eyes: Homefront which is available on HBOMax, the Ariel Award winner Home Is Somewhere Else, and Comedy Against the Odds. For more information about Shine Global, visit shineglobal.org.

ABOUT SHINE GLOBAL’S RESILIENCE AWARDS

The Shine Global Resilience Awards were created to honor films that highlight the strength, dignity, and power of children in the face of adversity. Past winners of Shine Global Resilience Awards include the feature documentaries Speak. (2025, Directed by Guy Mossman and Jennifer Tiexiera), Daughters (2024, Directed by Angela Patton and Natalie Rae), Name Me Lawand (2023, Directed by Edward Lovelace), and Lift (2022, Directed by David Petersen), Los Frikis (2024, written and directed by Tyler Nilson and Michael Schwartz) in partnership with Nantucket Film Festival, the short Rise (2025, Directed by Jessica J. Rowlands), the short documentary Ayenda (2023, directed by Marie Margolius) in partnership with Heartland Film’s Indy Shorts International Film Festival, Okthanksbye (2023, Nicole Van Kilsdok) with ReelAbilities Film Festival, Savauges (2024, directed by Claude Barras), and Dounia – The Great White North (2024, directed by Marya Zarif and André Kadi) in partnership with the New York International Children’s Film Festival.

ABOUT SHEFFIELD DOCFEST
Sheffield DocFest is the UK’s leading documentary festival and one of the world’s most influential markets for documentary projects. We champion and present the breadth of documentary form – film, television, podcast, immersive and art – in the vibrant city of Sheffield each June. We offer makers and audiences a place for inspiration, debate, development, learning and challenge. Our programming represents our core values – creativity, empathy, freedom, inclusivity and internationalism. https://www.sheffdocfest.com/