University of Southern California

CRCC American Muslim Civic Leadership Institute

Current Fellows

The American Muslim Civic Leadership class of fellows for 2012-13. These fellows completed and graduated from the program in April 2013.

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Mustafah Abdullah

Having experienced marginalization as an American-Egyptian Muslim in both the U.S. and Egypt, Mustafa has worked to build the beloved community in which everyone feels a sense of belonging. As a senior at Wake Forest University and a member of...

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Tanzila Ahmed

Tanzila "Taz" Ahmed is the voter engagement manager for the Asian Pacific American Legal Center in Los Angeles, where she is working on the Your Vote Matters! 2012 campaign, a non-partisan voter engagement and mobilization effort turning contacting over 500,000...

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Ishraq Ali

Ishraq Ali is a movement building fellow at the Long Island Civic Engagement Table, close to his hometown of Ronkonkoma, New York. In a county where Latinos, African Americans and Muslims are under-represented, the organization has registered over 4,000 new...

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Nermeen Arastu

Nermeen Arastu is an attorney whose practice area includes commercial litigation, immigration law and civil rights matters. Presently, Nermeen is an associate in Simpson Thacher & Bartlett's New York office where she has worked on securities, white collar and antitrust...

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Zahra Billoo

As the executive director for the CAIR San Francisco Bay Area (CAIR-SFBA) chapter, Zahra Billoo strives to promote justice and understanding. In 2009, Zahra joined CAIR-SFBA and immediately embraced her roles as community organizer and civil rights advocate. She frequently...

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Tamim Chowdhury

Tamim Chowdhury is a community organizer, entrepreneur and real estate professional. Professionally, Tamim is a member of the Center for Realty Policy with the U.S. General Services Administration in the Public Building Service. He is an entrepreneur in the hospitality...

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Dustin Craun

Dustin Craun is a writer, educator, community organizer and a communications strategist who has worked with more than 25 different nonprofit and social movement based organizations over the last twelve years in the United States, Mexico, and Ghana. Dustin works...

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Makram El-Amin

Imam Makram El-Amin’s commitment to service and civic leadership has made him a pillar in the Minneapolis community. As imam of the historical Masjid An-Nur, he’s led a growing, culturally diverse congregation in his hometown to the forefront of interfaith...

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Khizer Husain

Khizer Husain is the president of American Muslim Health Professionals, a national public health nonprofit organization. Under his leadership, AMHP convened the first-ever faith-based roundtable at the Department of Health and Human Services focused on mental health wellness. Mr. Husain...

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Tariq Hussain

Tariq Hussain is the executive director and co-founder of SMILE, a New Jersey, nonprofit organization dedicated towards poverty relief. Tariq’s vision for SMILE was to establish an institution that would take a multi-faceted approach towards poverty relief addressing obvious issues...

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Taif Kaissi

Dr. Taif Kaissi is the co-founder, vice president, and executive director of Medical Network Devoted to Service (MiNDS), a nonprofit organization based in southern California that provides charitable specialty healthcare to the uninsured patients. MiNDS also focuses on economic empowerment...

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Naveen Malik

Naveen Malik is a presidential appointee in the administration of President Barack Obama. She proudly serves her country at the Department of Defense, in the office of the secretary of Defense, where she was selected for the prestigious White House...

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Jenan Mohajir

Jenan Mohajir is the leadership institute manager at Interfaith Youth Core (IFYC), where she oversees curriculum development, recruitment and production for the Interfaith Leadership Institutes. Prior to this role she managed IFYC’s international projects including Interfaith Leaders for Social Action...

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Atif Moon

Atif Moon was born in 1985 with a late stage cancer of the spinal cord and had little chance of survival. Despite three surgeries at the age of one month and four more surgeries, one lasting 14 hours, he moved...

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Sabrina Qureshi

Sabrina Qureshi serves as the finance and operations director of the Council for the Advancement of Muslim Professionals (CAMP). She joined CAMP in 2006 as an events planner for the Chicago chapter. Sabrina was active in helping plan the CAMP...

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Aisha Rahman

Aisha Rahman, Esq., is executive director of KARAMAH and also heads the Family Law Division. Ms. Rahman received her higher education at Emory University and the University of Tennessee College of Law, where she was a staff editor of the...

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Khalis Rashaad

Khalis Rashaad serves as the resident imam of Ibrahim Islamic Center in Houston, Texas. Ibrahim Islamic Center is a mosque that focuses not only on the spiritual needs of its members, but also on the socio-economic issues in the urban...

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Hussein Rashid

Hussein graduated with a BA from Columbia College of Columbia University and then went to the Harvard Divinity School where he completed a Masters in Theological Studies. He then received an MA and Ph.D. from Harvard’s Near Eastern Languages and...

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Asim Rehman

Asim Rehman is president and co-founder of the Muslim Bar Association of New York (MuBANY), a professional organization for Muslim lawyers, law students, and legal professionals in the New York area. MuBANY provides services to members, builds bridges with members...

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Jamiel Sheikh

Jamiel Sheikh, a native New Yorker, is managing director at Rainfall Capital, a value investment fund he started in 2009 and is currently managing in excess of $25 million in assets. He has successfully launched and exited several ventures including...

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Maggie Siddiqi

Maggie Siddiqi is program coordinator at the Islamic Society of North America’ Office for Interfaith and Community Alliances in Washington, D.C., where she oversees implementation of interfaith dialogue and community outreach program and conducts outreach to government officials and stakeholders...

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Hira Siddiqui

Hira Siddiqui is currently the director of operations and education at the UMMA center in Waukegan, IL. The UMMA Center’s mission is to empower the lives of underprivileged individuals in Lake County by providing educational support and community resources. The...

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Manar Waheed

Manar Waheed is the policy director at South Asian Americans Leading Together (SAALT). Prior to working at SAALT, she worked with Legal Services of New York City where she provided direct services to domestic violence survivors who were primarily from...