Abstract:
We are facing a looming crisis in higher education. By the year 2025 UNESCO estimates that there will be nearly 100 million qualified applicants seeking seats in universities that do not exist. But the solution is right before us: online learning in its current and future forms has the capacity to radically transform higher education providing opportunities for all qualified students regardless of who they are or where they are. President Shai Reshef will discuss how University of the People—the world’s first non-profit tuition-free American accredited online university—is leading this Education Revolution changing the world one student at a time.
Biography:
Shai Reshef is the President of University of the People (UoPeople)—the world’s first tuition-free non-profit accredited online academic institution dedicated to opening access to higher education. Grounded in the belief that knowledge is a key ingredient of world peace UoPeople provides access to collegiate-level studies to qualified individuals regardless of geographic financial or societal constraints.
An educational entrepreneur Reshef has over 25 years of experience in the international education market. From 1989 to 2005 he served as Chairman of the Kidum Group a for-profit educational services company. Between 2001 and 2004 Reshef also chaired KIT eLearning the online learning partner of the University of Liverpool and the first online university outside of the United States.
President Reshef has been widely recognised for his work with UoPeople including being named one of Fast Company’s 100 Most Creative People in Business; selected by OneWorld as one of its ‘People of 2009;’ awarded an Ashoka fellowship; joined UN-GAID as a High-level Adviser; presented at TED; granted an RSA Fellowship; selected by The Huffington Post as the Ultimate Game Changer in Education; nominated as one of Wired Magazine’s 50 People Changing the World; and selected as a Top Global Thinker by Foreign Policy Magazine. Recently he was awarded the Prince’s Prize for Innovative Philanthropy by Prince Albert II of Monaco.
Reshef’s TED Talk has reached more than 5 million viewers.
An expert on the intersection of education and technology Reshef has spoken internationally at numerous conferences including TED; DLD; TEDxOxbridge; World Economic Forum; EG5 Conference; TEDxKC; Google’s Higher Education Summit; EMV Human Values meeting; The Economist’s Annual Human Potential Summit and the Schools for Tomorrow Event for the New York Times. He has lectured at Yale Harvard Stanford and Oxford among others. Reshef holds an M.A. in Chinese Politics from the University of Michigan.
