About Us

Charif Hamidi Founder & CEO

Charif Hamidi is a former investment banker and strategy consultant turned social entrepreneur. He is the founder of Education 4.0 (Ed4.0), an education innovation social enterprise that leverages fourth industrial revolution technologies to empower youths, develop their creativity, cognitive skills, and design and systems thinking, and prepare them for future labor markets. Ed4.0’s mission is to provide quality education for all, prepare youth for future labor markets and disrupt the traditional high fixed cost model of education. In addition to the social impact projects, Charif and the Ed4.0 team advise private equity firms on education technology deals and governments in preparing for the fourth industrial revolution by developing labor market models, socioeconomic reforms, investment strategies, future studies, and search-and-matching models. Charif has led several research projects to study the fourth industrial revolution’s disruption of labor markets and investigate education and technology reforms to offset jobs lost to automation. He contributes to magazines, such as the Harvard Business Review. Charif has sat on the board of directors of tech companies and NGOs such as Togenit and People to People International. He is frequently invited to speak at international conferences as a subject matter expert and appears on news networks to comment on innovation trends, markets, mergers, and monetary policy.

Naida Kardas, M.Ed. Chief Pedagogy Officer

Naida Kardas is the Chief Pedagogy Officer of Education 4.0. She is an education and innovation professional, a social entrepreneur, and a proactive humanitarian. Naida specializes mainly in early childhood education, curriculum design, educational leadership, and education policy. She started her career in a Fortune 500 company in the financial services industry; however, she later left the corporate world to pursue her passion for education and obtained two master’s degrees in early childhood education and education leadership from Arizona State University. In addition to her extensive experience in the classroom, Naida has collaborated with the U.S. Department of Education, thinktanks, and education consulting organizations to implement Common Core State Standards in turn-around schools and developed innovative pedagogical strategies for the benefit of children refugees. Furthermore, Naida has extensive youth program development experience and has created several programs and associations that seek to enable students in the Middle-East and North Africa (MENA) region to gain knowledge and technical skills necessary for the fourth industrial revolution.

Naida is currently the president of the Abu Dhabi Chapter of People to People International (PTPI – AD), a humanitarian organization that promotes peace through understanding. As president of PTPI – AD, she mentors a group of university students from New York University – Abu Dhabi and empowers them to lead women empowerment, refugee relief, and civic innovation focused projects. Naida has conducted a variety of research studies in education, second language acquisition, literacy, women refugees and effects of displacement after war. Her current action research project studies effects of education technology within differing socioeconomic demographics. Being the education policy and cognitive learning subject matter expert of Ed4.0, Naida is the chief architect of the organization’s pedagogical material and differentiated learning strategies. She oversees product development and quality assurance and leads all pedagogical related research and operations.

Enisa Kulasin, Ph.D. Education Consultant

Dr. Kulasin has over 20 years experience in the education sector. She has worked in the classroom as a professor, developed curricula in alignment with European Union standards, and designed differentiated innovative strategies for primary, secondary and post-secondary students. Dr. Kulasin is an accomplished author, researching a variety of topics relating to education.

Phyllis Burks, M.Ed. Education Consultant

Burks has over 25 years experience in the education sector. She has worked in turnaround schools focusing on raising numeracy achievement. Phyllis has designed curricula for schools in the US utilizing 4IR innovative methods. She has been recognized by the US Department of Education for her work.

Melanie Van Wagner M.Ed., Education Consultant

Van Wagner has over 16 years of experience in the education sector. She has been recognized by the state and the Department of Education for her work with youth and consistently developing curricula that succeeds in closing the achievement gap in low socioeconomic status areas.

Ana Hernández Carreto Innovation Subject Matter Expert

Ana holds a Master’s Degree in Educational Psychology with more than 10 years of international experience across Central and South America, Europe and the Middle East.

Baptiste Decarra Edtech Consultant

Baptiste is a passionate consultant believing in making an impact through technology. Given his background in digital transformation and technology consulting Baptiste advises on Edtech digital operations. He formerly worked for multinational companies across various industries and public organizations as a digital advisor. His consulting background has shaped his mind to approach complex problematics and solve important problems while leveraging on technology.

Braden Lawson, DAT Research Associate

Dr. Lawson has experience in statistical analysis and action research in clinical practice. As a research associate at Ed4.0, Braden is passionate about utilizing research data to gauge and convey the impact results of our pedagogical programs. Given his background in sports medicine and clinical research, Braden brings in a wealth of experience in conducting random control trials and quantitative research.