With over 6,000 years of history, the Iranian-American community in the U.S. strives to nurture and preserve its rich cultural heritage, while adapting to new traditions, fusing the best of East and West, and planting roots in its adopted country.
While the most recent survey puts the number of Iranian-Americans at 448,722; many agree that number is likely much closer to 1 -1.5 million nationally.
Washington, DC is home to the third largest Iranian-American community in the U.S., the Persian/Iranian community is an ethnically diverse one, comprising of Persian-, Turkish-, Armenian- and Kurdish-Iranians, just to name a few. Similarly, the community represents different faiths such as Zoroastrianism, Christianity, Judaism, Baha’i, Shia and Sunni Islam.
Education is one of the most important values and plays a central role in the community and the lives of many Iranian-Americans. According to the census data, 51% of Iranian Americans hold a bachelor’s degree and more than one in four Iranian-Americans hold a Master’s degree or higher. One of the best data on the Iranian-American community comes from a survey conducted by MIT in 2005.