Maryam Zahid is an award-wining Afghan-Australian human rights champion, diversity and inclusion practitioner, self-taught artist and social commentator. 

Maryam Zahid is the founder of Afghan Women on the Move, an organisation that supports the health, mental wellbeing, individual growth and development of Afghan and other women of diverse migrant backgrounds. Maryam’s work aims to help women reach their full potential in all aspects of life: employment, study, art, financial literacy, swimming and more.  

Maryam grew up in Afghanistan and arrived in Australia just before her twentieth birthday. Having missed out on the opportunity to go to school as a child, Maryam convinced the principal of Blacktown’s Mitchell High to allow her to enrol, despite being several years older than the other senior students.  

Maryam has over twenty years’ experience in the community sector, working in domestic violence, refugee resettlement and with newly arrived migrants.  

She was Blacktown City Woman of the Year in 2019 and is currently a Westpac Social Change Fellow for 2024. She studied Values and Public Policy at Oxford University and graduated from Stanford University Executive Program for Nonprofit Leaders. 

Alongside her community work, Maryam is an emerging playwright and exhibition producer. 

We are Blacktown is a UTS Impact Studios production.
Producers: Britta Jorgensen, Jane Curtis, Celine Teo-Blockey 
Executive Producer: Olivia Rosenman
Sound design: Melissa May
Research: Jackie May
Podcast artwork: Alexandra Morris
Theme music: Beaming by FRIDAY

Maryam Zahid is an award-wining Afghan-Australian human rights champion, diversity and inclusion practitioner, self-taught artist and social commentator. 
Maryam Zahid is the founder of Afghan Women on the Move, an organisation that supports the health, mental wellbeing, individual growth and development of Afghan and other women of diverse migrant backgrounds. Maryam’s work aims to help women reach their full potential in all aspects of life: employment, study, art, financial literacy, swimming and more.  
Maryam grew up in Afghanistan and arrived in Australia just before her twentieth birthday. Having missed out on the opportunity to go to school as a child, Maryam convinced the principal of Blacktown’s Mitchell High to allow her to enrol, despite being several years older than the other senior students.  
Maryam has over twenty years’ experience in the community sector, working in domestic violence, refugee resettlement and with newly arrived migrants.  
She was Blacktown City Woman of the Year in 2019 and is currently a Westpac Social Change Fellow for 2024. She studied Values and Public Policy at Oxford University and graduated from Stanford University Executive Program for Nonprofit Leaders. 
Alongside her community work, Maryam is an emerging playwright and exhibition producer. 
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We are Blacktown is a UTS Impact Studios production. Producers: Britta Jorgensen, Jane Curtis, Celine Teo-Blockey  Executive Producer: Olivia Rosenman Sound design: Melissa May Research: Jackie May Podcast artwork: Alexandra Morris Theme music: Beaming by FRIDAY

Portraits of Blacktown community leaders and people working for change. You'll hear from a doctor who is sounding the alarm about how dangerous heat can be for human health, a basketball coach whose players have made it to the big league, a Dharug traditional owner whose art and stories are telling the true history of the area's first people, and many more Blacktown legends.   

Experience stories of strength and thriving communities, straight from Sydney's West. And to see pictures of each of these people, visit https://impactstudios.edu.au/weareblacktown

We are Blacktown is part of a place-based audio project by Impact Studios, supported by the Paul Ramsay Foundation. The project, Welcome to Blacktown, sought to learn about Blacktown’s many and varied communities, together with the innovative and inspired social change work that is happening there. Over six months, the Impact Studios team conducted almost 100 interviews with people connected to Blacktown, exploring and investigating the question of how communities thrive. The interviews were rich, broad and non-extractive. We sought to understand the full context of what each person was doing. We listened to them tell stories of their lives, on their own terms: their families, their passions, their work and what motivates them to do it, their challenges and achievements. 

We are Blacktown is produced by Impact Studios at the University of Technology Sydney, in partnership with The Paul Ramsay Foundation. 

Portraits of Blacktown community leaders and people working for change. You'll hear from a doctor who is sounding the alarm about how dangerous heat can be for human health, a basketball coach whose players have made it to the big league, a Dharug traditional owner whose art and stories are telling the true history of the area's first people, and many more Blacktown legends.   
Experience stories of strength and thriving communities, straight from Sydney's West. And to see pictures of each of these people, visit <a href="https://impactstudios.edu.au/weareblacktown">https://impactstudios.edu.au/weareblacktown</a>
We are Blacktown is part of a place-based audio project by Impact Studios, supported by the Paul Ramsay Foundation. The project, Welcome to Blacktown, sought to learn about Blacktown’s many and varied communities, together with the innovative and inspired social change work that is happening there. Over six months, the Impact Studios team conducted almost 100 interviews with people connected to Blacktown, exploring and investigating the question of how communities thrive. The interviews were rich, broad and non-extractive. We sought to understand the full context of what each person was doing. We listened to them tell stories of their lives, on their own terms: their families, their passions, their work and what motivates them to do it, their challenges and achievements. 
We are Blacktown is produced by <a href="https://impactstudios.edu.au/">Impact Studios</a> at the <a href="https://www.uts.edu.au/">University of Technology Sydney</a>, in partnership with <a href="https://www.paulramsayfoundation.org.au/">The Paul Ramsay Foundation</a>.

A series of immersive portraits of Blacktown community leaders and people working for change. You'll hear from a doctor who is sounding the alarm about how dangerous heat can be for human health, a basketball coach whose players have made it to the big league, a Darug traditional owner whose art and stories are telling the true history of the area's first people, and many more Blacktown legends.

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