event details - Living Legend Award Ceremony- Ms. Nasreen Kasuri

Concept Note:

Honoring the Services of Mrs. Nasreen Mahmud Kasuri for quality education in the country through her brainchild the Beaconhouse School System that has now spread across the country offering services from Montessori level to higher education at Beaconhouse National University. Nasreen Mahmud Kasuri, graduated from the Kinnaird College, Lahore, with a degree in History and Applied Psychology. She studied Child Psychology at the Punjab University at Post graduate level and did her MBA from TRIUM, the combined degree programme of NYU,

London School of Economics, and École des Hautes Études Commerciales de Paris. The lack of quality education in Lahore for her own children, motivated her to open her first Montessori school for toddlers in 1975 known as the Les Anges Montessori Academy, it was the precursor for the first Beaconhouse School which opened in April 1978. The second (franchised) school chain known as the Educators, was launched in 2002, and today the group caters to a combined student body of over 315,000 students. She spearheaded the introduction of a progressive, broad-based approach to education, while making a significant contribution to the transformation of the independent education sector in Pakistan. Over these four and a half decades, Beaconhouse has developed into one of the largest educational systems in the world spanning seven countries. She has also played a pivotal role in women’s empowerment in the country. Sixty-two per cent of Beaconhouse’s 15000+ employees are women, with a high percentage of them in the upper management cadres. She has been active in promoting women’s empowerment through her own organization and has also been an active member of the Women’s Action Forum (WAF). The Beaconhouse schools, under her stewardship have always been very actively involved in a number of charity initiatives over the years. The students and staff were all encouraged to contribute toward charity in times of national calamities like the earthquake of 2005 and the floods etc. She pioneered the establishment of Pakistan’s first liberal arts university, Beaconhouse National University (BNU), in 2003. BNU is a private, not-for-profit institution offering undergraduate and graduate programmes in modern disciplines, many of which are not offered in any private sector university in Pakistan. In a very short time BNU is now a name and presence in higher education. She has served on the Boards of many government and non-government organisations. Actively involved in a number of not for-profit and charity organisations, she received the ‘Sitara-e-Eisaar’ award from the Government of Pakistan in 2006 for her philanthropic and humanitarian contributions.

In 2012, Nasreen Kasuri received the Women Power 100 award in London. Pakistan Power 100 is an event that honors the achievements and contributions of influential men and women from within the international Pakistani community and recognizes the positive impact they have had on a local, national, and international level. She also received the ‘Fatima Jinnah Award 2014’ in recognition of her meritorial services in the field of Social Sector Entrepreneurship.