Rishi Desai

Medical Fellow, The Khan Academy

Rishi Desai is trained as a pediatric infectious disease physician and has worked at prestigious academic centers across the country. Desai has always had a love for learning and has taught students at every stage of his career: he has won numerous teaching awards for medical education, and his passion for teaching brought him to the Khan Academy. Founded by Sal Khan, the Khan Academy provides self-pacing software and unlimited access to over 3,000 instructional videos on its YouTube channel. The website and library of educational videos—one of the most-used libraries on the web—offers lessons on everything from basic arithmetic to college level science and economics, humanities, test prep and now, medical and public health information. Since joining the team, Desai has worked with multiple medical schools to implement online video-based content directly into their curriculum.  

Desai had an accelerated early education, completing high school and receiving his BS in Microbiology from UCLA by the age of 18. He has worked at hospitals affiliated with UCSF, Harvard University, Boston University, USC, and Stanford University. He also spent two years working at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention as an Epidemic Intelligence Officer where he worked on disease outbreak investigations.