Ananya was born and brought up in India and has done her bachelor’s in chemistry from St. Stephen’s College, Delhi University.  She dabbled in Neuroscience in Cambridge, Göttingen and Stockholm before switching to Education. She was a school teacher in a rural school for two teachers and digitized Science curriculum for grades 5 and 6 in Hindi. Post a Liberal Arts degree, she worked with CorStone on resilience-based interventions and STiR Education around intrinsic motivation in Indian teachers in public school system at a systemic level.  

Currently, she explores Socio-Emotional (SE) Skills both from a theoretical and empirical perspective. She is particularly interested in exploring SE skills at the intersection of poverty and gender.

She also co-founded SwaTaleem Foundation in India which works together with Dalit and Tribal girls, teachers and government officials.