Noorain Khan is Director of the Ford Foundation’s Office of the President, where she oversees the foundation's global discretionary grantmaking and leads cross-foundation strategic projects and initiatives that emerge from the President’s priorities. A member of the foundation’s program leadership, Noorain served as a key partner for the President on the foundation's historic $1B social bond offering. Noorain also oversees the foundation’s efforts in disability inclusion, including global grantmaking, operational oversight, and philanthropic sector engagement. Her leadership on disability at Ford is the subject of a Harvard Law School case study on public sector leadership.
Before joining Ford in 2015, Noorain was chief of staff to the CEO and co-founder of Teach for All and founder of Teach for America. Earlier, Noorain was an attorney at Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz, where she advised clients on cross-border mergers and acquisitions and governance. In addition, she represented clients pro bono in family law and Supplemental Social Security Income proceedings.
Noorain serves on the board of Girl Scouts of the USA, where she is a Vice Chair and a member of the Executive Committee. She has also served on the boards of Libraries Without Borders, the New York Women's Foundation, the Brooklyn Children's Museum, and the Association of American Rhodes Scholars.
Noorain has received the George Parkin Service Award for outstanding contributions to the Rhodes Trust and was honored by Rice University’s Center for the Study of Women, Gender, and Sexuality with its Distinguished Alumna Award. She appeared on the Forbes 30 Under 30 list for law and policy in 2014 and is a term member of the Council on Foreign Relations.
Noorain earned a juris doctor degree from Yale Law School, where she was a PD Soros Fellow; an MPhil in migration studies from Oxford, where she was a Rhodes Scholar; and her bachelor’s degree from Rice University.
