As a first year master student and newly to the city and academic arenas Mekarem carefully guided and supported me, always with great willingness and patience.
There’s something really special about a teacher who can hold class at 7pm on a Wednesday and manage to keep everyone fully engaged. Mekarem’s style of instruction is everything but stale, and encourages participation in a non-judgmental, thought-provoking way through debate-style discussions and open conversations about current events. It’s so clear that she cares about students and research alike, and has done such a wonderful job of bridging those two worlds by suggesting pieces of academic literature and helping us decipher such sources critically. Mekarem is someone who is passionate about the betterment of our world and this passion spills over to us students palpably.
-Spring 2024 Planning Law Student
Navigating graduate school programs are tough and require an immense amount of self advocacy. Throughout my time in Mekarem’s sections, she taught me not only how advocacy’s for myself but also how to succinctly describe my work and execute analyses. I find her passion for teaching and commitment to students overwhelmingly inspiring. Despite ongoing world problems, Mekarem showed up with a smile on her face and fervor to lead us in the classroom.
-Spring 2024 Planning Law and Fall 2023 Planning History & Theory Student
Mekarem was very effective and engaging at leading discussions and I really appreciated how she thoughtfully listened and built upon the points we brought up. She always added depth to the discussion and was very good giving us relevant prompts and questions to think more about the topics being discussed. I’m also a pretty shy person typically, but I felt that Mekarem was able to foster an environment that made me very comfortable to share my ideas with the rest of the group
-Fall 2023 Planning History & Theory Student
Mekarem was the best TA I had at GSAPP! She critically engaged us in a diverse array of topics every week during Planning History and Theory, and made complex ideas accessible and applicable to contemporary planning practice. Her feedback on assignments was thorough and helped me improve as a writer, and she was always generous with her time outside of class during office hours. Some of my favorite sessions were when Mekarem shared her own research and applied critical and progressive lenses to our course discussions of longstanding history and theory in the planning world.
-Fall 2023 Planning History & Theory Student