College was an intangible dream for me growing up as a first-generation, Muslim American kid in Marin County, California in the era of rising Islamophobia. Fast forward to year 2013 when I did indeed graduate with a bachelor's degree in Peace and Conflict Studies from UC Berkeley.

A true optimist, I wanted to literally "save the world" right after college! Well, that still holds true to some degree, but the reality of the world's circumstances instead led me to focus on doing good and creating change in small increments. This led me to an on-and-off path of dedicating the next few years of my life in the local San Francisco Bay Area non-profit field working directly with underserved communities.

At the same time, I was a private tutor for students and volunteered teaching English to low-income immigrants in Marin County. Moreover, I cherish the opportunities to work alongside and learn from the international communities I served while teaching English in Barranquilla, Colombia and Ankara, Turkey as a Fulbright Scholar.