Indian teacher Rouble Nagi received the Global Teacher Prize 2026 during the World Government Summit on Wednesday, winning the one million dollar award presented by GEMS Education in its tenth edition. Sheikh Hamdan bin Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Crown Prince of Dubai, presented the Global Teacher Prize 2026 to Rouble Nagi, a teacher from India.
Nagi was honoured in recognition of her efforts to transform neglected walls into interactive educational murals that teach reading, writing, and arithmetic, alongside key concepts related to public health and environmental awareness. Over the past two decades, she has helped integrate more than one million children into formal education by employing art as an educational tool. She was selected from more than 5,000 nominations and applications received from 139 countries.
Through her foundation, the Rouble Nagi Art Foundation, she established more than 800 educational centres across India, providing safe and inspiring spaces in over 100 low-income communities and villages. These centres enable out-of-school children to begin structured learning and gradually return to formal education, while supporting enrolled students through remedial education programmes, psychosocial support, and creative activities.
The concept of living walls of learning is central to Nagi’s work, through which she transforms abandoned walls into open learning classrooms. She travels extensively across India, working directly with children in educational centres and mentoring teachers. Nagi has recruited and trained more than 600 teachers and volunteers, creating a scalable model that responds to children’s educational, social, and economic needs.
Her programmes have succeeded in reducing school dropout rates by more than 50 percent and significantly improving long-term educational retention. Nagi plans to allocate the prize money to establish a vocational institute offering free training in professional skills and digital literacy, aiming to create transformation in life opportunities for millions of underprivileged children and youth.
The Global Teacher Prize, presented by GEMS Education and organised by the Varkey Foundation in collaboration with UNESCO during the World Government Summit, honours exceptional educators for their outstanding contributions to the teaching profession.
