Our Team

Before founding AQL Labs, Rahim was Deputy Director of Innovation and Technology Enabled Solutions in the Postsecondary Success strategy at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the world’s largest global strategic philanthropy. During his 12-year tenure, he developed, managed, and directed strategy and investments across multiple portfolios, including digital learning, HBCU digital infrastructure, developmental education reform, and student advising and support systems. Rahim’s leadership and investments led to numerous advancements in innovation, R&D, and evidence-based reforms across multiple domains in higher education, including adaptive learning, scaling developmental education reforms, improving faculty professional development in evidence-based instructional practices like active learning, and seeding affordable, high-quality, national scale postsecondary models. Prior, Rahim played a crucial role in scaling globally JSTOR, Aluka, and ITHAKA - three mission-driven organizations founded by the Mellon Foundation. Today, these digital platforms serve hundreds of millions of learners and thousands of educational institutions around the globe.

Rahim serves as Vice-Chair on the board of Directors of the Seattle Colleges Foundation, as an independent Director of the venture-backed startup Lumen Learning, Climb Together, and AI Transfer and Articulation Network (ATAIN). Rahim was a finalist judge for the U.S. Dept. of Education’s Future Finder competition and recently also a finalist judge in the multi-funder learning engineering Tools competition. Rahim completed his postsecondary education at Boston University, the University of Chicago, the Institute of Ismaili Studies in London, and the University of Cambridge. Rahim is based in Seattle.