Shai Reshef


Shai Reshef is an Israeli businessperson and academic administrator. He is the founder and president of University of the People.

Early life and education

Reshef earned an M.A. in Chinese Politics from the University of Michigan.

Career

From 1989 to 2005, Reshef served as Chief Executive Officer and then Chairman of the Kidum Group, a for-profit educational services and test preparation company. Reshef joined Kidum in 1989 when it was a single product company with revenues of $100,000. Under his leadership, Kidum grew to become a company with annual revenues in excess of $25 million, with over 1,000 employees and 50,000 students a year. In 2005, he sold the company to Kaplan, Inc.
Between 2001 and 2004, while continuing as the chairman of Kidum, Reshef lived in the Netherlands where he chaired KIT eLearning, a subsidiary of Kidum. KIT became the eLearning partner of the University of Liverpool in 1999, and was the first online university outside of the United States, providing MBA and M.Sc. degrees in Information Technology. In 2004, the company was acquired by Laureate Education, Inc. and changed its name to Laureate Online Education. It maintains its partnership with the University of Liverpool under its new name.

University of the People

In January 2009, Reshef founded the University of the People, a non-profit, accredited online academic institution that seeks to increase the availability of higher education by offering tuition-free degrees. He serves as the institution's president.
In his 2014 TED Talk, entitled "An ultra-low-cost college degree", Reshef shared his vision to democratize knowledge. He views higher education as a human right. His TED Talk has been viewed over four million times as of 2017.

Personal life

Reshef is married to painter Rotem Reshef and has four children.

Awards and honors