Mariam Al-Shawaf began teaching 8th grade English at George Washington Middle School since 2012, and she started her teaching career in 2007. Mariam began teaching middle school English just north of the San Francisco Bay Area after graduating with a Bachelor degree in English Literature and Composition from the University of California at Davis in 2006. She served as the English department chair and created a mentoring group for young girls--empowering them to survive and thrive in middle school. In 2008 she moved to Washington, D.C., where she continued to teach, while serving as the chair of the curriculum committee for a grassroots organization that brought creative writing workshops into under-resourced classrooms. In 2011, that start-up became 826DC, a creative writing and tutoring center. Mariam served as the Programs Manager where she designed and led writing workshops, managed student publications, and partnered with organizations such as the President's Commission on Arts & Humanities. She spent the summer of 2012 teaching English in Palestine while working on an independent study that allowed her to compare cultural literacy amongst English Language Learners in domestic and international urban settings. She recently completed her Master's degree in Urban Education from the University of the District of Columbia. By participating in TGC, she explored the underlying causes of inner group conflict through the development of a narrative writing curriculum that enabled her students to connect their shared human experiences through collaborative storytelling.

Mariam believes that global citizenship requires individuals to unite to combat and understand differences and hardships, while combining our resources to help and learn from one another. She has created a global education unit plan on Global Narratives. In it, educators can find lesson outlines that push students to develop global perspectives. She has designed her unit plan to push students to understand that global perspectives allow students to become empathetic citizens of the world who are able to engage in diverse viewpoints, and make and retain international connections that create a space for growth and learning. On her International Field Experience, Mariam traveled to Ghana and compiled a collection of resources that is accessible on her travel blog.