For Myssan Al Laysy Stouhi, the trail to a Ph.D. has been something however typical. Born and raised in Lebanon, she has witnessed firsthand the challenges that educators face when instructing turns into an act of resilience somewhat than routine. Now, as she prepares to graduate this December from Indiana College of Pennsylvania’s Composition and Utilized Linguistics program, Stouhi is reworking her lived expertise into groundbreaking analysis that amplifies the voices of academics working in disaster contexts.
“I all the time had this curiosity as a result of, I imply, I’m Lebanese on the finish of the day,” Stouhi displays. “Since I used to be born, I all the time lived and labored in a context, in a excessive battle context. So, I wished to do analysis that may convey extra visibility and a spotlight to what issues are like for a trainer in Lebanon.”
Stouhi’s educational journey started on the American College of Beirut, the place she earned each her bachelor’s and grasp’s levels in linguistics. After instructing there for a number of years, she moved to the United Arab Emirates in 2014, spending a decade as a school member on the College of Sharjah in Dubai. It was throughout this time that she started envisioning a doctoral program that may enable her to proceed working whereas pursuing superior analysis.
“I wanted a Ph.D. program that was low residency,” she explains. “I spoke to professors at IUP and located students there who work on trainer identification, trainer feelings, trainer psychology, and instructing in disaster contexts, which was all the time my curiosity.”
Her timing proved prescient. Between October 2019 and October 2023, Lebanon skilled what Stouhi describes as “most likely the darkest time period that Lebanon witnessed in its trendy historical past.” The nation endured a revolution towards authorities corruption, a forex collapse that worn out 90% of the Lebanese pound’s worth, COVID-19 lockdowns, the devastating Beirut port explosion, conflict threats, and even earthquakes.
“It was unbelievably dangerous,” she remembers.
These issues grew to become the inspiration for her dissertation: “English as an Further Language (EAL) Academics Navigate Lebanese Academic System as a Disaster Context: Challenges and Sources.” Via interviews, focus group discussions, autoethnographies, and subject artifacts, she spoke with 9 academics to know how they navigated skilled and private challenges throughout this unprecedented interval.
“College students’ courses had been suspended in Lebanon earlier than the quarantine, due to the revolution,” she notes. “The scholars weren’t going often to high school anyway. I wished to see what their school rooms had been like, what sources they had been in a position to attract on, what sources had been absent.”
Her analysis philosophy extends past documenting hardship.
“Lebanon shouldn’t be the one disaster context on earth,” she emphasizes. “We stay in a globe of crises. Each nation is topic to crises, whether or not it’s a pure catastrophe, political factor, monetary factor. My final aim: what can the worldwide educational neighborhood be taught from Lebanese academics about navigating instructing in a really high-conflict context?”
Dr. Gloria Park, her dissertation advisor, acknowledges Stouhi’s distinctive contribution to the sphere.
“Myssan is likely one of the most resilient and robust doctoral college students I’ve labored with prior to now 17 years at Indiana College of Pennsylvania,” Park states. “Sure, the truth that she is in a Ph.D. program within the U.S. is a type of cultural and symbolic capital, but her steady instructing whereas matriculating in a Ph.D. program to ship cash to her household in Lebanon in addition to assist the needy academics who educate in disaster context is a testomony of her dedication and want to provide again to her dwelling nation.”
Stouhi’s non-traditional path by graduate faculty displays broader modifications in greater schooling. She participated in IUP’s summers-only excessive residency program, taking intensive coursework throughout eight-week summer time classes whereas sustaining her full-time instructing place. This mannequin allowed her to steadiness household obligations with educational aspirations — a juggling act she started considering as early as 2003.
Trying forward, Stouhi plans to affix the tutorial job market whereas pursuing activist work supporting academics in underrepresented contexts. She’s already related with colleagues creating capacity-building applications for Center Jap educators and is contemplating extra coaching in AI abilities and academic management.
Her message to potential graduate college students displays the pragmatic optimism that has carried her by years of balancing disaster and alternative. “In case your dream is to get a Ph.D., then begin a Ph.D. and see what it’s like, after which you’ll be able to resolve if that is for you or not. We make issues rather a lot more durable in our heads.”
As Stouhi prepares to defend her dissertation, she stays related to her Lebanese roots, visiting household yearly and sustaining her dedication to academic justice. Via her analysis, she is working to make sure that the voices of Lebanese academics — and by extension, educators dealing with crises globally — won’t be forgotten however celebrated as examples {of professional} braveness within the face of unprecedented challenges.
