Community News
On 30 June 2020, Salma Lakhani, a member of the Jamat in Edmonton, was named as the next Lieutenant Governor of Alberta by Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.
Houston’s Mayor Sylvester Turner accepted a donation of half a million reusable face masks from Focus Humanitarian Assistance USA (FOCUS) and the Ismaili Council for the Southwestern US. The formal announcement of the donation took place at Houston’s City Hall on 17 June 2020.
For Sofia Babool, a 20-year-old sophomore studying neuroscience at the University of Texas at Dallas, conversation in recent weeks has centered around Covid-19. The world seems to be on pause; her school, favorite coffee shop, everything in her life has been turned upside down.
Members of the Jamat in Tajikistan are helping their communities — which are at high risk of natural disasters — as part of the Community Emergency Response Team (CERT), an integral part of the Aga Khan Agency for Habitat (AKAH)'s emergency management activities.
Applying to an undergraduate programme can often feel like an arduous phase in a student’s life, even without the added burden of a global pandemic. However, this unprecedented time allows students an opportunity to seek out unique and creative ways to prepare themselves for the upcoming university application process.
During this time, through its Ismaili CIVIC initiative, the Kenyan Jamat has come together from across the country to volunteer time and resources to help those in need.
Since launching three weeks ago, The Ismaili TV — an online streaming platform offering 24-hour programming curated for the global Jamat — has been viewed over 800 thousand times. If you missed anything, a selection of programmes are now available to enjoy on demand.
Ever since Vaneeza Rupani was a little girl, she has been captivated by space exploration. She fed her interest by reading books about space at her school library and visiting the U.S. Space and Rocket Center in Huntsville, Alabama.
As our world faces the unprecedented challenge of fighting the novel coronavirus, we must acknowledge that we are living through a very unique time in modern human history. While some of us are facing challenges in making lifestyle adjustments to shelter in place, others are facing significant constraints, battling isolation, struggling with unemployment and financial uncertainty, or fulfilling a call of duty to protect communities and loved ones.
How does one define their role and value in society, or one’s purpose in life? Are we atomised beings moving through life in a random fashion or connected and “born of a single soul,” as the Qur’an informs us? How are we connected, and what is an individual without a community?
In mid-March, as Covid-19 arrived in Canada amidst fear and panic, Rahim Bhimani began talking with his peers in Toronto, discussing possible ways they could help to serve health care workers in the local area and beyond.
In his address at TEDxOudMetha, held at the Ismaili Centre Dubai weeks before widespread social distancing was implemented, Dr Salmaan Keshavjee, Professor of Global Health and Social Medicine at Harvard University and Director of the Harvard Medical School’s Centre for Global Health Delivery, discussed how many other diseases, beyond Covid-19, continue to affect peoples’ quality of life and cause untimely death, including diabetes, heart disease, cancer, and even curable infectious diseases such as tuberculosis (TB).