Nisha worked with an IT corporate for over a year as a tester for software projects. She had a monotonous but secure job and did not have the courage to quit. However, she hurt herself during a self-defense class at work and was bed ridden for few months. This break provided her an opportunity to leave her job and venture into a sector she was more interested in.  Nisha felt elated with this blessing in disguise. She started off with her own research study monitoring the air pollution levels in the city of Pune. Simultaneously, Nisha interned with an innovations accelerator that worked in low-income markets. The exposure to this field led her to also take up an online course on Global Sustainability from the University of Florida. She knew by then that she wanted her work to have an environmental and social impact. The IDEX programme and InvestWISE Scholarship gave Nisha the opportunity to explore various social enterprises and discover her passion.  Today she is successfully living her dream. Nisha is working with Nextdrop, a social enterprise in water, using her GIS skills and technical knowledge to bring about social change.

Nisha Devar

Rujuta Teredesai has 10 years of experience working and volunteering for non-profit organisations. A trained journalist, she specializes in, programme management, fundraising, and communications. She is the co-founder and director of Equal Community Foundation. She leads the ECF team in India, supporting overall operations with focus on programme development and partnerships. 

She is somebody who likes to get things done. Identifying a challenge and the ability break it down to start addressing it while handling relationships with multiple stakeholders has proven to be a core strength for me.

Potential for social change, innovation and immense job satisfaction are factors that attract her to the development sector and specifically to ECF.

Rujuta Teredesai-Heron

Shreena Thakore is the co-founder of No Country For Women - an organization dedicated to fighting systemic-gender based discrimination in India. While studying at Brown University, USA, she realized that there was a significant gap between the space of academia, where the sociocultural causes of gender-based discrimination are analyzed, and the space of activism, where social change is actually executed. Due to this disconnect, changemakers are not equipped with the appropriate analytical and introspective tools to effect lasting change. As a result, existing solutions and social activist movements tend to be ineffective or misguided. Shreena co-founded NCFW to bridge this gap. So far, NCFW workshops have reached 7000 students across 35 institutions in 17 cities. NCFW videos cumulatively have 1,500,000 views and NCFW digital campaigns cumulatively have 40,000 shares. Her work with NCFW has received national and international attention and has been featured on The Borgen Magazine, Policy Mic, DNA India, The Hindu, YourStory, Times of India, Bangalore Times, Bangalore Mirror, Delhi Times, Deccan Chronicle, Deccan Herald, India Times and Mail Today. She is a two-time TEDx speaker, a Projects For Peace Fellowship recipient, a Karmaveer Chakra awardee and a Karmaveer Global Fellow.

Shreena Thakore

Shaheen Mistri founded the Akanksha Foundation in 1991 and is the founder and CEO of Teach For India. Akanksha (www.akanksha.org) educates 5000 children in 15 schools - equipping them with the education, skills and character they need to lead empowered lives. Teach For India educates 30,000 children across 7 cities & is building, in parallel, a force of leaders who will be committed to demonstrating, inspiring and catalysing systemic change - until the day comes when all children across India attain an excellent education. Shaheen has a Masters Degree in Education from the University of Manchester, England. She is an Ashoka Fellow 2001, a Global Leader for Tomorrow at the World Economic Forum 2002, an Asia Society 21 Leader 2006 and serves on the boards of Akanksha, Ummeed, and the Thermax Social Initiatives Foundation. She also serves as a committee member for the National Council for Teacher Education.

ShannonInvestWISE

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