There are several layers to a trendy hijab, as I'm sure any female Muslim youtuber can tell you. There is a bottom piece of cloth, a bandana, that most girls use. The bandana is the most important yet under-appreciated part of the hijab. My bandana is always tied tightly and sturdily. I make sure the base of my hijab is unmoveble and strong. Likewise, because I have researched, understood and appreciated the beliefs that mandate this hijab, I am unwavering...

I traveled to Egypt after the two year revolution and volunteered at the Bibliotheca Alexandria. The friends I made at the library periodically told me of the woes of living in the still unstable nation. One overarching theme was the lack of affordable or good quality health care. In the morning I would research Greco-Egyptian relations at the library, and in the afternoon I would volunteer at the largest medical center in Alexandria, Al- Ashraf (The Honorable). There, the health...

Coming from a public school in Queens where one could find members of any and all racial, religious and economic backgrounds, I never felt alone and I always felt supported. At Brearley, I am the only hijab wearer, practicing Muslim, Arab, or Middle Easterner in the upper and middle schools. I feel like a diplomat who answers to the actions of anyone from the same part of the world or who adheres to the same beliefs as I do. During...

Works read during school: Middle March by George Elliot Categories of Persons- Megan Jones and Jacob Dlamini King Lear by William Shakespeare Complete Prose of Elizabeth Bishop Complete Poetry of Phillip Larkin Complete Poetry of Robert Lowell On the Genealogy of Morals by Friedrich Nietzsche The Art of Warfare by Sun Tzu A Muslim Suicide by Bensalem Himmich Oedipus Rex by Sophocles Medea by Euripides Works read for pleasure: Mansfield Park by Jane Austen Emma by Jane Austen North and...