Our Team
Muna Shami, Senior Research Analyst, joined AIR in 1999. She currently serves as the Evaluation Task Leader for the Access Center. She also serves as the Deputy Project Director for the National Center for Student Progress Monitoring, where she supports the Center’s Principal Investigators in implementing project activities to meet the Center’s goals. Muna also serves as the Evaluation Task Leader for the Access Center: Improving Outcomes for All Students K-8. In addition to her work on the centers, she is a Task Leader for the implementation of the Task Order Contract to the Office of Special Education Programs (OSEP) where she supports policy makers in collecting, analyzing, and reporting on the IDEA-Part D National Programs.
Her previous work experience includes working on two technical assistance centers: Muna serve as a Technical Assistance Liaison with the Elementary and Middle Schools Technical Assistance Center (EMSTAC) and she provided technical assistance to Safe Schools, Healthy Students grantees with the National Center for Mental Health Promotion and Youth Violence Prevention. In addition, she was the task leader for the Government Performance and Results Act (GPRA) Task Order Contract to OSEP, as well as AIR’s work in supporting OSEP’s Standing Panel, which oversees and conducts all IDEA-Part D grant reviews for the agency. Muna also worked on the Magnet Schools Assistance Program (MSAP) Evaluation of the 57 school districts that were funded 1998-2001.
Before joining AIR, Muna worked as a Research Assistant with the Social and Emotional Child Development Research Lab at George Mason University where she gathered data on the social and emotional understanding of 3-4 year-olds at local preschools. She was also a counselor at Northern Virginia Community College, counseling at-risk students, working with international students, orienting new students to the community college, career counseling, and student advising. Her duties were expanded to include coordinator of a summer technology career program for middle school students. Muna was also a research assistant at the Early Childhood Self-Regulation, Motivation, and Language Research Lab at George Mason University where she was part of a research team studying adult-child scaffolding and children's motivation, private speech, self-regulation, and task performance.
Muna is currently enrolled in the doctoral program in Education Studies at American University. She holds masters degrees in Psychological Services from Marymount University and Developmental Psychology from George Mason University and a B.A. from George Mason University in Psychology.
