Sammy Syed

Sammy Syed

Wichita, KS

Political Science, Class of 2019

I’ve been following the Refugee Crisis and have worked with many refugees on a personal level, be it by teaching a Syrian high school student via Skype, teaching English to a class of refugees at the International Rescue Committee (IRC), or working with them at my family restaurant in Kansas. I’m a political science major and have just completed my major paper on how ethnocentrism affects anti-immigrant sentiments and Islamophobia. This is something important to me and a topic I have studied in more depth in the last few months.

I am a Muslim American and know that Islam has been one of the most controversial topics in recent years. The rise of radical Islam has been detrimental to both Muslims and non-Muslims alike. To those who do not know more of Islam, much of their knowledge is the negative perception portrayed by media and public figures but also from these so-called “Muslims” who create crimes explicitly against Islamic values; I work to alleviate these negative perceptions as often as I can. I am by no means an expert on either of these topics but I certainly hope to contribute what I know to the trip!