At CAIR-Philadelphia we fully believe that the youth are our future and therefore it is important that we continue to invest our energy into ensuring we build up and empower the future leaders of our communities. Over the past weekend, middle and high school students from all over the greater Philadelphia area and Delaware joined CAIR-Philadelphia at the Philadelphia Masjid for the Muslim Youth Leadership Summit. This summit consisted of a weekend full of interactive workshops, creating a platform for current leaders of our communities and allies to engage and skill share with our future leaders.
Program Schedule | Photos
On Saturday morning, students were welcomed to the Philadelphia Masjid by Imam Kenneth Nuriddin. Following that, students participated in a panel and breakout activity with Charles Barr, a gun violence prevention activist, and Wafai Dias, showing how leadership and activism can be done both for local and international issues.
Our group of over 50 young members then heard from Sharif El-Mekki, founder and director of Center for Black Educator Development and Nationally recognized former Principal of Mastery Shoemaker, on racial justice in which they gained a deeper understanding on critical race theory. Aliya Khabir from AZK Communications then led a workshop on advocacy in the media and how to navigate communications/public relations to address important issues impacting our community.
Finally, Saturday ended with students learning from Dr. Hirotoshi Nishikawa from the Japanese American Citizens League who told students his story of being incarcerated at the age of 4 following the Pearl Harbor attacks and the time he spent in the camps. This panel also included Peter Pedemonti from New Sanctuary Movement who spoke about social justice within organizations and led the students in an activity called Chair Power.
Sunday started with an activity led by CAIR-Philadelphia staff and interns on school district advocacy. We were able to field positive and negative experiences of our students and chart pathways for advocacy. Then, Imam Arqum Rashid from the Islamic Society of Central Delaware spoke to our future youth leaders about past young leaders from Muslim history.
Dr. Quaiser Abdullah joined us Sunday afternoon to speak about diversity and inclusion and the best practices for processing conflict and communication. The summit ended with a storytelling workshop and spoken word performances by Imam Idris Abdul-Zahir from Masjidullah and Sarah Baig, a local spoken word artist. Finally, Imam Kenneth shared parting advice with our group.
Alhamdulillah, the Muslim Youth Leadership Summit was a success and we are grateful to the Philadelphia Masjid for hosting us, Muslims Serve for the delicious lunch on both days, the amazing speakers who brough so much insight to our program, to our volunteers (Zeynep, Naz, Sharia, and Saara) who helped hold the weekend together, and most importantly all the student leaders who took time out of their weekend to join us and the parents who trusted us. We are confident that they will, inshAllah, be the future leaders we call back to speak to the youth that come after them!
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