Fatimah Waseem Wins TMO Foundation Essay Contest

By TMO Stringer

Fatimah Waseem is a very impressive young woman.  While she was not able to attend the TMO Foundation fundraiser and awards banquet this past Sunday, she did send a videotape which showcased her brilliance and ability to use words in unique and powerful ways. 

She said in her video from Virginia that one of the main benefits of the awards banquet was the very fact of hundreds of Muslims being together in a room, “forced to network.”  She explained the benefit of having many diverse Muslims in one place for one purpose. 

One of her quotes was “We all like to champion these phrases of filling the so called void of Muslim journalists.  We talk about how we must give a voice to our youth.  That we have to step back in and put the “new” back in “news.”

The last words of her video were a clever tribute to The Muslim Observer, saying that as a Muslim observer, speaking to Muslim observers, she thanked The Muslim Observer for the award.

Fatimah is a student at the University of Maryland.  She won a scholarship for $1,250.

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