WASHINGTON -- Arkansas student Mariam Parray met with Secretary of State Antony Blinken Wednesday after winning the American Foreign Service Association's 2021 high school essay contest.
Parray, who grew up in Little Rock and is a senior at Pulaski Academy, won the national contest for her essay entitled "Diplomats and Peacebuilders in Tunisia: Paving the Path to Democracy," which explores democracy-building in the north African nation.
The contest prize included an all-expenses paid trip to the nation's capital, a $2,500 award and the opportunity to meet with Blinken.
"It was definitely an exciting experience," said Parray, who turned 17 Tuesday.
She is the daughter of Tariq Parray and Sameera Farooqi.
The process behind the winning essay took several months, she said, with the research itself taking several weeks. She wrote the essay in a week and then had about seven or eight people edit it, she said.
"It's interesting that Tunisia was really the only successful case study of the Arab Spring at that time," she said. "And what was important about the democratic transition, and how the United States helped, was that they built upon efforts that already existed within the country."
The Arab Spring, which took place in the early 2010s, was a series of anti-government protests in North Africa and the Middle East.
The American Foreign Service Association is the union for foreign service workers at foreign affairs agencies, according to the organization's website. It was established 1924.
One lesson Parray took from studying the Arab Spring and Tunisia was the impact of youth, she said, and "what it means to actually build trust among people and how inclusion of all groups, especially those marginalized, is important to peacebuilding."
Earlier this year, Parray was also one of 10 semi-finalists in the 2022 John F. Kennedy Profile in Courage Essay Contest.
More than 2,400 essays were submitted, according to a news release announcing this year's winner. The contest allows high school students nationwide to pen an essay on an act of political courage by an elected official in the U.S.
"I wrote about Liz Cheney and how she defended democracy by essentially going against Trump and her party when he said that the election was stolen," Parray said, noting that the Wyoming Republican lost her leadership position in the House.
Outside of essay writing, Parray said she is involved with her school's Amnesty club and plays flute and piccolo, among other activities.
She will be the co-president of her school's Model United Nations club this year.
"It's definitely a passion to learn. I want to learn as much as I can. And I think I've found a lot of that interest in social science," she said.
Bill Topich, one of Parray's teachers at Pulaski Academy, said the rising senior has a gift and sets the bar high.
Topich, who has been teaching for more than three decades, described Parray as one of the greatest students he's ever taught.
"She is a natural. She's very organized [and] is able to take large volumes of information, synthesize and analyze it very effectively," said Topich.
For her part, Parray said she wants to study international relations in the future and would like to attend Princeton University in New Jersey.
"I don't necessarily know what job that would lead me to," she said. "But I'll go wherever it takes me."
Pulaski Academy student Mariam Parray poses Wednesday in Washington with Bill Topich, one of her teachers. Topich said Parray is one of the best students he’s ever taught, calling her “a natural.” (Photo courtesy of Bill Topich)