Maeve Knepper

Maeve Knepper is from Cheyenne, Wyoming. She graduated from the University of Wyoming, where she majored in Economics and International Studies with a focus on Arabic and the Middle East. She first began studying Arabic in Jordan through the National Security Language Initiative for Youth, and she has since returned to the region several times, including to Morocco on exchange at Al-Akhawayn University, to Jordan through the Critical Language Scholarship, and most recently to Oman through the Boren Scholarship. For her honors thesis, she conducted interviews in Jordan on household resilience and the impact of water scarcity on Jordanian society. As an undergraduate, she also interned for the U.S. Embassy in Libya, the National Council on U.S.-Arab Relations, and a development organization where she assisted with report editing for USAID project site visits to post-ISIS Iraqi communities. She served as a co-chair for her university’s United Multicultural Council, served as the national chair for the Model Arab League Council on Political Affairs, and conducted research on the resource curse in oil-producing countries for the Department of Economics. She was also heavily involved with the University of Wyoming Arabic & Middle East Studies Program, where she worked on grant writing and student involvement, including an initiative to establish a Center for Arabic & Middle East Studies at UW. Maeve is passionate about uplifting rural communities and accessing natural resources, especially clean water. She is excited to pursue a career in diplomacy and aims to be a Humanitarian Assistance Officer for USAID. In her free time, she enjoys learning languages and is currently studying Spanish.