Get to know our speakers
Salim Kassam
Salim Kassam was born and raised in London, UK and is the co-founder and chief editor of The Muslim Vibe, an online magazine for Muslims in the West. Since it's launch of 2014, The Muslim Vibe has gained just shy of one million followers across its social media channels and attracts a quarter of a million website visitors per month.
Amany Killawi
Amany Killawi - Social worker turned social entrepreneur, Amany is the Co-Founder & COO at LaunchGood.com: A crowdfunding platform to support Muslims launching good all over the world by helping them raise funds for their projects, campaigns, and creative ideas.
Since its inception, LaunchGood has raised over 100 million for over 10,000 projects impacting 120 countries. LaunchGood has been featured on major news channels including CNN, AlJazeera, NPR, NBC and others.
Previously, Amany was a graduate of the School of Social work at Wayne State University, and founding member of the Detroit Minds and Hearts Fellowship, a social incubator where she worked with Muslim youth to help them develop and launch their own community initiatives for social justice. She has previously worked with multiple organizations in various capacities, including: the project manager and lead coordinator for the Institute for Social Policy and Understanding Improving Marriage Outcomes Study, Administrative Director of the American Learning Institute for Muslims, Data Fellow with The Children's Center of Michigan, and Youth coordinator at the Michigan Roundtable for Diversity and Inclusion.
Ahmed Saheb
Ahmed Saheb works in finance and volunteers with various faith-based organizations across the nation. Ahmed is the Board Treasurer for Penny Appeal USA which provides poverty relief across Asia, the Middle East and Africa. He is also an advisor to Launchgood.com, one of the largest faith-based crowdfunding sites in the world. He currently resides in Chicago with his wife and three year old son.
Shaykh Mahdi Shahkolahi
Shaykh Mahdi Shahkolahi is currently pursuing doctoral study in the Department of Theological and Religious Studies at Georgetown University. Raised in Maryland, Shaykh Mahdi earned his B.S. in Information Systems from the University of Maryland, Baltimore County (cum laude). Upon graduation, he spent 9 years studying traditional seminary sciences in Qom, Iran, earning a B.A. in Islamic Studies and Jurisprudence (summa cum laude), and an M.A. in Islamic Studies and Jurisprudence, with a minor in Philosophy (magna cum laude), from the al-Mustafa International University. Shaykh Shahkolahi serves the Muslim community – both in the Washington, D.C. metro area and throughout North America – by presenting talks, conducting workshops, and teaching classes at Islamic centers/masjids, seminaries, universities, schools, and spiritual retreats.
Hoda Katebi
Hoda Katebi is an Iranian-American writer, organizer, and creative educator. Her political fashion work has been hailed from the BBC to the New York Times to the pages of VOGUE and featured and cited in books, journals, and museums around the world. Hoda is the host of #BecauseWeveRead, a radical digital book club and discussion series with 20+ chapters globally; founding member of Blue Tin Production, an apparel manufacturing workers co-operative run by working class women of color; a national lead with Believers Bail Out, a bail fund using Zakat to bail Muslims from pretrial & immigration incarceration; and organizer with the No War Campaign. She is the author of the book Tehran Streetstyle (2016), and her writing has appeared in Newsweek, Washington Post, the Columbia Journalism Review, and she frequently gives talks and trainings on stages around the world. Hoda runs on saffron ice cream and colonizer tears.
R. David Coolidge
R. David Coolidge was born in Chicago, and raised in Kenilworth, IL. He has a BA from Brown University and an MA from Princeton University. He converted to Islam in 1998. From 2008-2013 he worked as a Muslim chaplain, first at Dartmouth College and then again at Brown. From 2014-2017 he taught an undergraduate course on Islamic law and ethics at New York University. He is currently a PhD student at the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley, CA.
Chaplain Muhammad Ali
Chaplain Muhammad Ali is a child of African American converts to Islam from the Northeastern United States. He has an extensive educational background beginning as a child at the American Institute of Quranic Studies in Blanco, Texas. He earned a B.A. in Psychology from Thomas Edison State University. He earned an MDiv in Islamic Chaplaincy and an M.A. in Islamic Education from Bayan Islamic Graduate School. Muhammad completed Clinical Pastoral Education residency at the UC San Francisco Medical Center and earned certification in Palliative Care Chaplaincy from UC San Marcos. Muhammad served as an Assistant Imam in Durham, NC and as an Imam in multiple Islamic Centers in the Bay Area. He worked most extensively as a Muslim Chaplain in the California State Prison and serves as VP of Correctional Chaplaincy for The Association of Muslim Chaplains. He currently works at Bucknell University in Central Pennsylvania as Chaplain for the Muslim Community and co-directs a mentoring program for underrepresented students. His current research is exploring the chronological revelation of the Quran and its application to personal and communal development
Hannah El-Amin
Hannah El-Amin is the founder and director of Alif Schoolhouse, a preschool cooperative program located in Chicago, Illinois. Having been raised in a family of educators and activists, it was she thought it was imperative that black and Muslim community members take the initiative to explore alternative approaches to education that will fulfill our children’s right to an uplifting, thoughtful, and empowering learning experience. As a child, she attended Sister Clara Muhammad school in Chicago, where her father was principal and her mother was a teacher. As a result, she understood from an early age the importance and benefits of community-driven schools, particularly with regards to building resilience in children. As a nationally recognized nutritionist, dietitian, and diabetes educator, she built a career centered around empowering patients with transformative knowledge in a nurturing and respectful environment. Similarly, through the Alif Schoolhouse homeschool cooperative, she sought to build a learning program that would empower parents to be able to offer their children an exceptional education in a nurturing learning environment.
Latifa Barnett
Latifa Barnett has always been inspired toward two endeavors: pursuing reliable Islamic guidance and empowering families to nurture their human potential through lifelong learning, spiritual development, and personal growth. In an effort to promote her love of teaching and learning, Latifa has organized and engaged with several community organizations over the last two decades. In 2014, Latifa co-founded the Junior Alliance for Worship, Action, and Development (JAWAD) an organization established as a safe space for Muslim youth to engage in activities that promote spiritual growth and community activism. Five years earlier, she began the Sisters Support Group (SSG), to create a forum for Muslim women to nurture social bonds and encourage each other toward personal and spiritual growth. In addition to these organizations, Latifa has been a dedicated supporter of multiple religious and educational efforts for the benefit of families in the Shia Muslim community, including most recently, Stand for Justice DMV.
Latifa earned a Bachelor’s degree in Mathematics and a Master’s degree in Education. She is currently the Co-Director of Al Hadi Learning Organization in Silver Spring, MD and a Mathematics professor at Montgomery College. Her professional teaching career has spanned 30 years. During this time, she has worked in both public and private schools as well as colleges. Latifa is a passionate proponent of home education, she has spent the last 18 years teaching her six children. In addition to her own children, Latifa has supported more than ten families through their home school journeys, with five of those students currently thriving in college.
Sayyid Sulayman Hassan
Sayyid Sulayman Hassan was born and raised in Western New York where he attended both school and college. While still in high school, he would attend classes in Arabic and fiqh at the Hawza Ilmiyya in Medina, New York, after which he attended the University of Buffalo and received a bachelor of science degree in business administration in 1997. Immediately after graduating from college, he went to Qum, Iran, to study at the Hawzah. In Qum, he soon studied the standard texts taught within the Hawza and proceeded to the advanced study of fiqh, during which time he also taught several of the standard Hawzah texts and translated several books and articles into English. Sayyid Sulayman holds a PhD from the University of Chicago. He is the resident scholar at Shahe Najaf Islamic Center. He is also the founder and president of the Ahl al-Bayt Islamic Seminary. He is a long-standing board member of the Islamic Texts Institute and a content editor for ITI’s publications. Sayyid Sulayman currently resides with his wife and three children in Virginia, where he continues to study and teach.
Hassan Najfi
As a coffee professional working with a local, specialty roaster called Five & Hoek, Hassan Najfi has amassed three years of industry experience, visited farms (in Medellin, Colombia), and competed in local barista competitions. He currently spends his time studying how to adjust brew parameters to maximize extraction and sweetness from brewing black coffee.
Abeer Najjar
Abeer Najjar is a chef, food writer and the founder of Huda Supper Club. A Chicago native and child of Palestinian immigrants, her culinary approach reflects her family's heritage and city upbringing. Abeer works to preserve culture and stimulate conversation about identity by using food as a canvas for storytelling. Along with writing, Abeer has shared her food through her underground supper club and a cooking show web series called "Abeer's Day Off." She represented the state of Illinois in the LifeTime series "Her America: 50 Women, 50 States" and her work has been featured in Teen Vogue, NPR, and other publications.