Muslim Leadership Program: Leading our future in the right direction

From business owners to board members, and nurses to teachers, on  Thursday 1 June 2023, the ISRA Centre in Sydney was packed for the opening night of the 2023 Muslim Leadership Program (MLP).  

MLP allows young Muslims to develop personally, professionally and spiritually; providing a launchpad to pursue passions that could one day shape communities.

This year, 28 young Muslims were selected to be a part of the 2023 cohort; which is a third of the total applications received.

Throughout the program, mentees will participate in workshops grounded in the Islamic framework. Experts from areas such as government advocacy, media engagement and Prophetic leadership will be invited to transfer their knowledge and inspire future Muslim leaders.

Mentees will also meet with their mentors on a regular basis. The mentors are vibrant community leaders who will provide guidance and wisdom that can help the mentees in the next months and inform their future directions.

This year will be the program’s fourth time running. Many of the previous year’s mentees were invited to form part of the organising committee for this year’s program.

For example, Nabiha, who was mentored in the 2022 cohort and Rayana, a mentee from 2021: who MC’d the opening night.

 

Rayana started with acknowledging the traditional owners of the land and gave some special mentions to Sister Zuleha and Brother Nabeil for taking on the job as program leads; and Ammar, Mariam, and Naima who all have been putting their time and effort into this program since February of this year.

Ahmet Ozturk was then invited to give some short words, allowing us to reflect saying,“We are all here for one reason. We want to contribute and we want to make change.”

He looked back on mentors he had in the past, and reiterated their potent place in all our lives. “Mentors are important to help you grow, and at ISRA, we have a formal structure where we connect Mentor and Mentee,” Ahmet further added.

The night continued with the mentors being briefed about mentees, while the mentees played a guessing game in the next room.

The game was for mentees to figure out who they were paired with, with clues outlining their mentors’ lives and accomplishments.

It was a beautiful display of the Muslim excellence that us mentees would have the privilege to learn from for the rest of the year.

Finally, the night ended with the exciting pairing of all the mentees and mentors. Conversations started taking place, and tears, laughter and exchanging of numbers were in plenty.

Voices of all ages were echoing through the ISRA Centre, and only after multiple announcements did it start to clear out. It was clear no one wanted to leave.

This was a night to be remembered.