Shai Reshef, 2026 Prize Winner

Shai Reshef founded the University of the People on a simple but ambitious premise: higher education should be available to anyone qualified to pursue it. As founder and president of the first-ever nonprofit, tuition-free online university with U.S. accreditation, he created a new model designed to expand access to students who have historically been excluded from higher education.

Today, the university serves more than 170,000 students across more than 200 countries and territories, including tens of thousands of refugees and other displaced learners as well as Afghan women whose educational opportunities have been restricted. Under Reshef's leadership, University of the People has demonstrated how technology, volunteer expertise, and innovative institutional design can create new pathways to learning at a global scale. In doing so, he has helped reshape conversations about who higher education serves and how it can be delivered.