Suchetha Bhat is the CEO of Dream a Dream, a non-profit organization that empowers children from vulnerable backgrounds to overcome adversity and thrive in a fast-changing world. Since starting her career in 2001, she has worked both in the corporate and social sectors. After a successful 9-year corporate stint where she worked with MNC’s such as Larsen and Toubro and IBM, she started her journey in the social sector as a volunteer with Dream a Dream. The experience convinced her to get a Postgraduate degree in Psychology and join the organization full-time in 2010. Due to her success in driving the scale and strategic direction of Dream a Dream as COO, she was promoted to CEO in 2018. Her pioneering work in developing their design framework has firmly positioned Dream a Dream as a thought-leader in the space of Life-skills in India. Under her leadership, the organization has grown from working with 10,000 young people in Bengaluru to over 1 million children across 5 states. Suchetha is on the Advisory Council of Amani Institute and Kizazi. She is also an advisor to many young women social entrepreneurs and non-profits in India.

Financial services leader with more than 25 years of experience in Banking and Insurance globally, worked with AIG, Standard Chartered Bank & Bank of America. Previously was with AIG Middle East as Director / Profit Centre Head, held P&L responsibility for Consumer Insurance business for 9 countries in the Middle East and North Africa Region. IVY-League management graduate who blends sophisticated business strategy with interpersonal relationships and inspiring leadership to build long term strategic partnerships. Highly passionate about empowering youth with 21st-century skills.

Bhavani Arumugham has a double master's degree in Biotechnology and Special Education with an experience of about 12 plus years in the development and disability sector. She is a registered RCI professional with a wide range of experience from Early Intervention to Employment, for various disabilities. Human psychology and understanding human behaviours interest her and she is passionate about working with children. She is pursuing her research in curative education -The Holistic development of a child on the emphasis of integrating nature, arts, music, and movements.

Pavithra joined Dream a Dream’s life skills programme as a young adolescent girl. She was part of the mentoring programme and other life skills initiatives. At the age of 16, she joined as an intern and has grown within Dream a Dream since then. Pavithra is passionate about working with young people and believes in creating the support systems for young people that she didn’t have access to. She completed her graduation in commerce from Bangalore University while working with Dream a Dream. A multi-tasker, she has donned different roles across projects and has proven her ability to adapt herself to a challenging work environment. Currently, she works as Associate Director - Innovation Lab where she is responsible for ensuring and engaging with over 10000 young people along with a 50+ member team, developing various skill development modules for young people. Her mission is to work with young people and transform their lives using the life skills approach. Pavithra also works as a Lead Facilitator training teachers/community workers across Karnataka as part of the Teacher.

A psychologist, specialized in constructivist psychology, worked extensively on culturally informed psychological assessments, rubrics, and authentic assessments. A passionate educator working closely on Pedagogies of Social and emotional learning and wellbeing, Education in emergencies, Epistemology of education. He holds a Masters in Counselling Psychology and a PhD. in Life Skills Education. Currently, a researcher keens on policy change and advocacy focussing on Evidence-Based Reform in Education. Before joining Dream a Dream, he was working as Assistant Professor at various universities in India TISS, Mumbai and Christ University, Bangalore. He has also served as a consultant for a project on developing Life skills-based Educational activities in collaboration with MIT, USA. He has rich experience working with educational institutions, universities, and organizations in Japan, Malaysia, US, Thailand, and Dubai.

Varsha Pillai has over 16 years of experience in the communication space, a bulk of which was spent as a TV news journalist at reputed news organizations like CNN-IBN and ANI-Reuters. A research addict, she has been an NFAI (National Film Archives of India) research fellow in 2009 and a NUFFIC Fellow (Netherlands Fellowship) in 2017. In 2019 she was one of the 10 young leaders selected globally to attend the Winterschool for Thinktankers in Geneva (Jan-Feb 2019) under the On Think Tanks and Think Tank Initiative Fellowship. She is also a PhD research scholar with Symbiosis International University studying Gender Advocacy through Digital Media.

Shrikanth is currently the Director - Operations. He comes with 10 years of experience in different capacities in the NGO sector. He has worked in areas of primary education, teacher development, DIETs, DDPIs NGOs and community-based work. He played an important role in scaling the Teacher Development Programme to different areas in Karnataka and in maintaining a key relationship with our partners. Shrikanth is currently playing a key role in working with the Delhi Government and other key advocacy partners.

Ansar has been Manager - Special Projects at Dream a Dream since 2012. In the past, Ansar managed 10 learning centres for the holistic development of young people and the training facilitators at Makkala Jagriti for 6 years. He was also responsible for executing a research on 'Traditional Occupations by Minority Groups'. This report was presented to Justice Rajendra Sachar, an honourable Supreme Court judge for the rehabilitation of minority communities. At Dream a Dream, Ansar plays a key role in hosting and organising Dream a Dream’s annual conference “Change the Script”. Ansar enjoys making toys out of trash and uses them in his storytelling sessions with children and young people.