Mai Atta
Professional Bio
Mai is a writer and educator. She has a Bachelor’s degree in Marketing & International Business from the Arab Academy for Science and technology in Cairo, Egypt, as well as seven years of experience working with youth and adults in formal and informal contexts. Before moving to the U.S., she was designing and implementing development and capacity building training in student organizations, NGOs, and corporations. Mai also holds a Certificate in mental health first aid. Her areas of expertise involve research in field work, data collection, curriculum development, and facilitation. Mai’s areas of interest involve social movement learning, youth and young adult development, resilience in times of conflict, culture, identity, and evidence-based interventions for youth. After a semester at University of Rochester, Mai is currently a PhD student and graduate assistant at Pennsylvania State University.
Related Materials
This article presents the results of a comparative study of learning and education in contemporary student movements in Chile, Egypt, and Puerto Rico, which arose as responses to neoliberal economic grievances. The study uses an andragogical lens to analyse these movements as examples of collective self-directed pedagogical practice by and within social movements. Drawing on Santos’ (2006) sociologies of absence and “emergence”, the study utilizes autoethnographic and secondary data analysis to voice social movement-based learning alternatives. We argue that, despite the different contexts of each movement, they still share many commonalities in organizing and educating in response to global neoliberalism.