Faculty Founder
Dr. Admir Masic is the Founder and Faculty Director of the MIT Refugee Action Hub (ReACT). Driven by his own personal experience as a teenage refugee from Bosnia Herzegovina, Masic knows firsthand that a good education is the ticket to a better life, “knowledge is something no one can ever take from me.”
In 1992, due to the Bosnian War he was forced to migrate to Croatia. While living there, he enrolled as a non matriculating student at a technical high school. He displayed a strong performance in chemistry while in school, and as a result, was eventually approved to receive a high school diploma. With the help of generous sponsors, he continued his higher education at the University of Turin and he co-founded Adamantio SRL, which works to preserve ancient cultural heritage.
Masic is Associate Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering at MIT. Masic holds a doctorate in Physical Chemistry from the University of Turin, and specializes in science-enabled engineering of sustainable construction materials relevant for large-scale infrastructure innovation. In his work, he combines principles of bioinspired and archeological materials science, with multiscale chemical and physical characterization approaches to inform the design of sustainable materials for construction, energy, and the environment. He is a principal investigator in the Concrete Sustainability Hub at MIT and Faculty Fellow in Archaeological Materials at MIT’s Center for Materials Research in Archaeology and Ethnology (CMRAE).
Megan Mitchell is the Associate Director, Pathways for Talent with the MIT Jameel World Education Lab at MIT Open Learning.
Previously, Megan was the Director of Fellowship and Student Programs for the Legatum Center for Development and Entrepreneurship at MIT and a Lecturer at the Sloan School of Management. In that capacity she led the Center’s efforts to support students building impact-driven ventures across emerging markets. The Center’s capstone program is a competitive fellowship through which Megan taught, mentored and advised student entrepreneurs from across MIT, connecting them to resources across the Institute’s innovation ecosystem and the Center’s networks locally and globally Beyond the fellowship, Megan designed and delivered programs (e.g., bootcamps, speaker series, special seminars, immersion programs) to support both students and global entrepreneurs across the entrepreneurial lifecycle as they explored opportunities for impact at scale. Prior to joining MIT in January of 2017, Megan managed UBS Americas’ Elevating Entrepreneurs initiative, a portfolio of philanthropic partnerships and programs focused on driving toward a more inclusive entrepreneurial landscape. This included Project Entrepreneur, a collaboration with Rent the Runway Foundation to increase the pipeline of women building economically impactful companies. Prior to UBS, Megan oversaw co-curricular and experiential learning activities for Wharton Entrepreneurship, including the annual business plan competition and global internship program. She also served as a member of the Venture Initiation Program management team and led development of the department’s venture development programs at the school’s San Francisco campus.
Megan holds a BA in Economics and Public Policy Studies from Duke University and a MSEd from University of Pennsylvania’s Graduate School of Education.
Camila Massa is a social entrepreneur and innovator. Her work focuses on advocating, generating ideas and solutions in projects with relation to social, environmental and economic impact. She works at the MIT Refugee Action Hub with Hub Management and Community Coordination, in charge of general logistics and business operations as well as providing support to learners throughout their program journey.
She holds a BA in Business Management from the Catholic University of Uruguay, where she specially focused on social businesses management after being selected as a Scholar for the US Department of Education, as a SUSI Student Leader on Social Entrepreneurship. Also, from a young age, she began a career in climate activism by being one of the coordinators of the international movement Fridays for Future Uruguay. She is part of the University Innovation Fellows program from Stanford University, whose mission is to empower students to become leaders of change in higher education spaces. Lastly, she co-founded Manchas Uruguayas, an organization whose mission is to raise visibility and awareness about vitiligo in Uruguay while creating a community with everyone living with the condition.
Somaia Zabihi is a computer and data science instructor at the MIT Refugee Action Hub (ReACT). Her professional life has always been intertwined with teaching. Although she has faced challenges and difficulties in her learning and working journey, but still, her main interest is to teach and learn. After achieving master degree in software engineering from the Technical University of Berlin, Germany, she joined the Faculty of Computer Science at Herat University, Afghanistan. Throughout her eleven years of teaching experience, her passion for teaching has elevated her as an outstanding instructor. She always encourages the young generation and specifically girls to empower themselves with learning, technology and pursue STEM as vital solutions to create a better world!
Prior to her migration, she was serving as dean of the Faculty of Computer Science, where her innovative leadership led to the creation of the groundbreaking “Department of Professional Computer Education” at Herat University. Under her guidance, a series of impactful training sessions and enlightening scientific webinars were conceived and executed, focusing on the timely theme of “Overcoming quarantine challenges”. In 2021, after the Taliban took the power in Afghanistan, Somaia made the most difficult decision to migrate to Canada. Then here in Canada, she discovered the potential for collaboration with the MITReACT to reignite her passion.
