Leila Awad

I am grateful to the Department of Global Middle Eastern Studies for pushing me to challenge my own perceptions of the Arab community, as a Lebanese American. Under GMES, I was given unparalleled flexibility to explore classes from a diverse range of departments and schools, each providing a stimulating environment in which I was able to explore the social, cultural, and political realities of the past while recognizing how their legacies are felt in the Middle East today. I am especially grateful to Professor Mark LeVine, who is the director of the GMES department, it was under his mentorship that my academic interest in Middle Eastern history and culture flourished and eventually led me to double-major in Global Middle East Studies and History. Inspired to expand my Arabic language skills, explore the complexities and intricacies of Lebanese history, and further embrace my familial roots, I set my mind on studying abroad in Lebanon. Thanks to the department’s unwavering support, I was sitting in my first class at the American University of Beirut six months later. As I continue my education at NYU’s master’s program in Near Eastern Studies, I will build on the foundation and utilize the tools that I was given as an undergraduate under the Global Middle Eastern Studies Department.

Eliza Partika

The program in Middle East Studies has exposed me to a culture and people I did not know much about before coming to university. Through this program, I have not only grown as a writer but as a student, an observer, and a traveler. In my study of the Middle East, I was exposed to ancient civilizations and art that predate and often form the values we take for granted in the West. I learned about politics and colonialism and conflict resolution with such depth and care for the people experiencing the conflicts in the region that I took this knowledge and studied abroad in Israel and Palestine with the Olive Tree Initiative and the Fact Finders Learning Mission. I began learning both Hebrew and Arabic. I have gained so much insight about myself as a writer and as a result of this program, have determined a clear role for myself as an arbiter of information about culture and conflict. I hope this knowledge of a beautiful people and culture will propel my career as a foreign correspondent. I will be studying at UC Berkeley's Graduate School of Journalism as a Foreign Language and Area Studies Fellow to study Arabic and the Middle East and to earn an M.A. in Journalism.