Volunteer Spotlight: Ankur Sahu, E91, A22P

"Growing up in India, I always had a desire to go abroad," says Ankur Sahu, E91, A22P. His first week at Tufts, in which he participated in a special orientation program for international students, proved auspicious; some of the people he met that week remain his best friends to this day. When he arrived, Ankur was one of just a handful of international engineering students at Tufts. He found the Tufts engineering regimen to be very high in quality and he liked his professors and his work in the computer lab. But it was the opportunity to study engineering "in the midst of an amazing liberal arts environment" that he found most unique and exciting about his experience at Tufts. He even dabbled in liberal arts a bit himself, taking a couple of Japanese language courses.

After graduating, Ankur accepted an engineering position with a Japanese company. "I had a lot of respect for the fact that my Tufts education prepared me well," he reports. After returning to the classroom—this time to earn his MBA at Harvard Business School—Ankur moved into finance, working for Goldman Sachs for a number of years, and living in multiple locations around the world. He observed that, in the early years, Tufts didn't appear to be well-known internationally; but as time went on, he noticed that Tufts was increasingly becoming recognized.

Ankur has been an active volunteer for Tufts in numerous capacities. He joined the International Board of Advisors in 2014; the Board of Trustees in 2016; and the Board of Advisors for the School of Engineering in 2018. He also serves as the international chair of Brighter World's Campaign Cabinet.

The concept of "impact" is a common thread in Ankur’s remarks. "Education can change the world. It's a tool that can enable someone to achieve a lot personally and to have an impact on society. My wife, Mari, and I wanted to help someone attend Tufts who couldn’t afford to come; so, we endowed a scholarship." The Sahus also recently endowed a junior professorship for the School of Engineering, leveraging the matching power of the Professorship Partnership Challenge and ensuring that their philanthropy has a significant impact not only on students, but on the faculty who inspire them and who advance research and scholarship.

"We have something very special at Tufts. We provide a high quality, interdisciplinary education—and we're also a research university. I credit President Monaco with bringing people together who care about causes—and finding solutions."