In almost any state, you can be sure to find civic leadership projects for Jewish, Hispanic and other groups that focus on civic leadership development for their communities. Yet the same cannot be said for the Georgia Muslim community, until now.

An initiative of the Islamic Speakers Bureau of Atlanta (ISB), the Institute for Muslim Civic Leadership (IMCL) is the first of its kind for the Georgia Muslim community, and we need your help. In order to reach our full potential for developing Muslim leadership, our goal is to raise $20,000 for the Institute before September 30, 2018. 

By donating, you are directly contributing to a program dedicated to developing the next generation of civic leaders for the Muslim community. Our hope is that with the success of this pilot program, other states can emulate it to meet their community's needs. 

If you aren't convinced yet, here is why this pilot program is a breakthrough.

The IMCL is designed and managed with the Georgia Muslim community and the greater community in mind, with a team of leading consultants and scholars. ISB’s team held focus groups with diverse participants to crowd-source ideas and advice from the community members themselves on what they believe the community needs most. In addition, they benchmarked the program against several other leadership programs and will be implementing the best practices. They are dedicated to selecting diverse IMCL participants and to grow talent that will impact communities.

ISB Atlanta recognized that the Georgia Muslim community does not have much exposure to the outside community and vice versa. The IMCL’s inception is the product of wanting to put Muslims at the tables they need to be. “We want to be able to form a force within the Muslim community to help others and ourselves do a better job and fill that gap,” explains ISB’s Founder and Executive Director, Ms. Soumaya Khalifa.

In a span of one full Saturday per month for nine months, IMCL participants aged 25 – 40 will train in leadership modules such as Local Government, Communicating Effectively, Building Communities Through Collaboration, and Managing Conflict. These will feature guest speakers who are industry thought-leaders and practitioners. In addition, there will be group projects for participants to implement their training and newfound resources.

As Ms. Khalifa remarks, “We are making history. The IMCL inaugural class will make history.”

To learn more about IMCL, http://isbatlanta.org/imcl/.