Vahan H. Gureghian is the founder and CEO of CSMI. Mr. Gureghian founded CSMI on the premise that by applying basic business management principles to schools, and separating the business of operating a school from academics, teachers and administrators are freed up to focus on what they do best, educate students. That operating philosophy, combined with educational innovations that empower students, is helping to change outcomes and reverse negative trends.
Mr. Gureghian, a successful attorney and businessman, turned his attention to education in 1998. Under his leadership, CSMI has helped the Chester Community Charter School become a safe haven for learning with its secure and state-of-the art campuses. Since the school's founding in 1998, Chester Community Charter has grown from an enrollment of 97 students to roughly 4,500.
Additionally, Mr. Gureghian and the CSMI team have provided management services to the Atlantic Community Charter School in Galloway Township, New Jersey.
Mr. Gureghian is committed to the growth of alternative education options that provide a choice in public education for parents and students in America’s most disadvantaged school districts. Mr. Gureghian is proud of the innumerable achievements of the graduates of CCCS and ACCS in high school, college, and in life.
Mr. Gureghian is also founder and principal of several successful companies with holdings in media and telecommunications industries. Mr. Gureghian was a partner at the Stradley Ronon law firm and the Obermayer Rebmann law firm. He was also Managing Partner at the law firm of Clark & Ladner. Under his management, Clark & Ladner was named one of the fifty fastest growing mid-sized law firms in America.
Mr. Gureghian previously served on the Board of Trustees of the University of Pennsylvania, the Board of Delaware County Community College, and the Board of Directors for the Philadelphia Regional Port Authority. He is also a former Trustee for the Villanova University Business School.
Mr. Gureghian has received numerous awards and commendations including, but not limited to, the Phi Delta Kappa Kudos Award for Service in Education, the Chester Rotary’sPaul Harris Award for Outstanding Service, and the Honorary Gold Membership, from the Lower Merion Fraternal Order of Police.
Through the Gureghian Charitable Foundation, Mr. Gureghian and his wife, Danielle, have provided hundreds of high school and college scholarships to promising Chester students. They are also responsible for donating Thanksgiving meals to residents of Chester over the last ten years, and giving hundreds of thousands of dollars in holiday gifts to CCCS students.
Mr. Gureghian received a Bachelor of Science degree in Accounting and Finance from Villanova University and a Juris Doctor from Delaware Law School.