Rawaan Alkhatib, from the United Arab Emirates, is a first-year MFA candidate in poetry at the Iowa Writers’ Workshop. She held a year-long research assistantship at the International Writing Program in 2009-2010.

In fall 2009, she worked one-on-one with the visiting writers to edit and polish a variety of presentations, including weekly panel talks held at the Iowa City Public Library. Alkhatib also arranged for MFA candidates from the Writers’ Workshop and the Nonfiction Writing Program to read each week at the Prairie Lights bookstore reading series, alongside two IWP writers in residence.

In spring 2010, Alkhatib, in conjunction with the UI Libraries, organized the The University of Iowa’s first book collecting competition. Her duties included composing press releases and otherwise informing departments and programs about the existence of the competition, designing and distributing posters, generating text for a website, and screening contest submissions.