Faculty Profiles
Soraya Wirth
Phone
Soraya, a native of Egypt, received training in teaching Arabic as a second language from Penn State STARTALK Arabic Academy for Teachers. Her approach to teaching is geared toward developing functional abilities to use Arabic accurately and fluently in speaking, listening, reading and writing. As culture is the fifth language skill, students are equally invited to learn about basic cultural concepts related to the Arab world.
Education
MS Mechanical Engineering, University of Notre Dame College of Engineering
BS Mechanical Engineering, Southern University, Baton Rouge, Louisiana
Courses Recently Taught
Since her arrival at Saint Mary's in 2010, Soraya has taught introductory Arabic language courses as well as Intermediate Conversation and Reading Arabic courses.
Professional Experience
Soraya taught Arabic at Honeywell to employees traveling to Egypt and Saudi Arabia and taught Arabic to youths at the ISM school for ten years. She lectured at Notre Dame and Purdue universities regarding women's achievements and career development in the workforce and was an advisor to the Notre Dame Minority Engineering Program (MEP). Soraya worked for Honeywell International for 30 years and is a Honeywell Six Sigma Certified Black Belt. She published papers in the IEEE technical journal and lectured at Notre Dame in the area of Control Systems/Application. Soraya was awarded a US patent for the commercial fuel control system on the GE 747 Jet Engine.