Aisha Khurram is the co-founder of CrissCross nonprofit organization. She served as the Afghan Youth Representative to the UN in 2019. During her mandate as the UN Youth delegate, she advocated for the implementation of the Youth, peace and security 2250 UNSC resolution in Afghanistan which would have ensured the meaningful and nationwide participation of young people from policy to practice at the Afghan peace process in 2019. In order to implement the 2250 resolution in Afghanistan, she  co-founding national youth consensus for peace, which was the first self-organized, volunteer and nation-wide youth movement consisted of over 200 youth led organizations and activists across seven provinces of Afghanistan.  Aisha later on became a member of young female peace mediator initiative of Konrad Adenauer Stiftung Afghanistan in order to advocate for the preservation and protection of young women’s rights in the post-peace negotiation Afghanistan.

She was pursuing her undergraduate studies in the department of law and political science at Kabul University. She had one month to graduate when the Afghan government collapsed in August 2021. After the Taliban takeover, she left Afghanistan and has been living in Germany since then. Aisha received two scholarships from Gerda Henkel Stiftung and Bard College Berlin, where she is currently pursuing her undergraduate degree in Humanities, concentrating on Ethics and Politics. Aisha is currently pursuing Masters of Public Policy at the Hertie School of governance in Berlin and is the recipient of the prestigious Digital Governance full scholarship of Hertie School.

She recently served as an intern with Heinrich Boll Stiftung, contributing to the successful organization and management of the “Afghans in Exile Forum” for Afghan diaspora in Germany in collaboration with Humboldt University of Berlin. Aisha successfully organized and documented series of online and in person discussions among Afghan diaspora in Germany which was intended to provide a coordination platform for Afghan activists in Exile and help the Federal government get a profound understanding of Afghan diaspora’s visions and concerns for the political future of Afghanistan.

Since 2022, she has been voluntarily working and advocating for refugees right to Tertiary education through her active engagement in the regional chapter of the Tertiary Refugee Student Network supported by UNHCR. Through this network she advocated for the 15 by 30 agenda of UNHCR which was a campaign designed by UN and its partners to raise awareness and mobilize efforts for the increased enrollment of young refugees in higher education. In her role as the Regional leader of Tertiary refugee students’ network, Aisha advocated and delivered speeches on high level events and platforms e.g. World higher education conference of UNESCO in Spain, Transforming Education summit of the UN in New York, Global Refugee Forum in Geneva and many more.

In 2023, she was elected as the steering committee member of the Global Students Forum where she built collaborations between refugee and non-refugee student right advocate. She managed to streamline refugees’ right to tertiary education discourse into the global student movement, where refugee student advocates and regional student unions collaborated to develop pledges for the Global Refugee Forum of 2023. In her role as the representative of TRSN and GSF’s steering committee member she strategized and facilitated partnership between refugee students and non- refugee student advocates across different regions by organizing workshops and information sessions on 15by30 agenda of UNHCR and involving non-refugee student activists to join the cause of refugees’ increased enrollment in higher education by the year 2030. The series of workshops led to the articulation and adoption of a unanimous position paper which was developed and endorsed by all regional student union members of the Global Student Forum and was presented to the Global Refugee Forum in December of 2023. This collaboration fostered through Aisha Khurram’s innovative and consistent advocacy was the beginning of a long awaited, impactful unity and voice among students across the world for refugees right to education.

Aisha Khurram is also the recipient of the Open Society University Network’s Civic Engagement fellowship and in In February 2022 she started her advocacy efforts for Afghan girls’ right to education together with the network of former youth delegates to UN. Their advocacy efforts led to the establishment of an E-learning platform with the support of UNESCO office in Afghanistan through which Afghan girls are provided with online accredited degree courses to continue and complete their higher education.  The e-learning platform is now expanding its services to more students across different provinces of Afghanistan by providing online degree programs of International University of applied sciences which is intended to help Afghan girls continue and complete their interrupted higher education through innovative, alternative means while helping develop the necessary skills to secure online jobs and alternative means of financial stability.