Shaheen was born in Mumbai, grew up in five countries around the world and at the age of eighteen, returned to Mumbai to do something about the unequal opportunities that children have in India.

Shaheen founded the first Akanksha (“aspiration” in Sanskrit) centre in 1989 with 15 children. The Akanksha Foundation today runs 26 Akanksha Schools across Mumbai, Pune and Nagpur impacting over 14,000 students and 4,000 student alumni. In 2008, searching for a way to impact more children and inspired by the Teach For America model, Shaheen founded Teach For India with the audacious vision of providing an excellent education to all children across India by building a movement of leaders committed to ending educational inequity in India.

Today, 17 years later, Teach For India impacts 37,000 children through the direct work of ~1,000 Fellows and over 250 staff members across eight cities, and has produced over 15,000 student alumni. Additionally, the Teach For India Alumni community is 6,000+ members strong, impacting 1 million children directly and reaching 50 million children indirectly. Shaheen is an advocate for student voice and partnership, and has created high-impact initiatives like the Maya Musical, the Kids Education Revolution, and The Greatest Show on Earth which explore student leadership.

She has been an Ashoka Fellow, a Global Leader for Tomorrow at the World Economic Forum, and an Asia Society 21 Leader. She has been a recipient of accolades such as the Jamnalal Bajaj Award for Development and Welfare of Women and Children in 2019, the Beyond Business - ET Prime Women Leadership Award for 2020, Niti Aayaog’s Women Transforming India Award and the Ramachandra-Ikeda Award in 2022, to name a few. She is the author of the book, Redrawing India and the Miss Muglee children’s books.

Shaheen’s work for children over three decades has mobilised thousands of people to work together for systemic change in education. She has built the largest network of education change-makers in the country.