Salah Ayari received his Ph.D. in Curriculum and Instruction from the University of Minnesota in 1997. He taught Arabic at the University of Minnesota for five years and at Augsburg College in Minneapolis for four years. He also taught Arabic to middle and high school students and designed curricular for middle and high school Arabic emersion programs at Concordia Language Villages in Minnesota. Dr. Ayari worked as the Principal of a K-12 private school for seven years prior to moving to Texas A&M University in the fall of 2007 to serve as the first Director of the newly-created Arabic and Asian Language Office.