Shaheen Mistri is the CEO of Teach For India, a nationwide mission to build a movement of leaders who will eliminate inequity in education, and serves as one of its founding board members. She has earned global recognition for her unrelenting devotion to educating and empowering the less privileged children of India.

Shaheen is also the Founder of the Akanksha Foundation, a non-profit organization with a mission to impact the lives of low-income children, enabling them to maximize their potential and transform their lives. Akanksha started after-school centers for its students, with a focus on English, math, values and extra-curricular activies, and then changed its model to running schools in partnership with the government. Over the past 20 years, Akanksha has expanded from 15 children in one center to over 4,000 children across its 40 after-school centers and 13 schools in Mumbai and Pune.

Shaheen received her Master’s in Education from the University of Manchester. Among the numerous awards and recognitions she has received, Shaheen is an Ashoka Fellow (2001), a recipient of the Indo-American Society’s Young Achiever Award (2001), a Global Leader for Tomorrow at the World Economic Forum (2002), an Archana Trust Woman Achiever (2003), an Asia Society 21 Leader (2006) and serves on the boards of Ummeed, The Thermax Social Initiatives Foundation and is an advisor to the Latika Roy Foundation. She also serves as a committee member for the National Council for Teacher Education (NCTE), overseeing teacher education.