Dear friends!

Hello everyone, and welcome back! This is the first issue of the Islamic Society's newsletter and we'd like to mention that it is also the first one ever published in the history of our society. Hopefully (inshaa'allah), it will mark the ambitious beginning of our more active performance at Middlebury.

Islamic Society at Middlebury College (ISMC) will aim at the two main objectives:

• Firstly, our activities will focus on increasing awareness about Islam among non-Muslims not only on campus but also beyond our College community. This will definitely include an attempt to dismiss any untrue stereotypes and misunderstandings about Islam and will hopefully decrease any prejudices that spring out of ignorance. We will be glad to take part in an interfaith dialogue organized by the Chaplain.

• Secondly, we will try to create a conducive environment for the Muslim students at Middlebury to practice their religion. This will entail creating links with other Islamic organizations in Vermont, and at other universities and colleges in New England. We also have many other exciting activities planned out for the rest of the year. We are a small society but if we are enthusiastic enough, and put in adequate effort, we will be able to accomplish our goals. Our success, of course, will depend on the contributions of all the members.

For this academic year 1995-1996, the Board of the Islamic Society consists of four members who are responsible for coordinating the activities of the society:

President: Fauzia Rehman (x6366)
Vice-president: Michael Arlantis (x3621)
Treasurer: Alexander Perjéssy (x3983)
Secretary: Margaret Muhammad (x6270)

All members will soon receive the complete mailing list of the Society.

The Society had its first meeting last Friday (September 22) at 7:00 p.m. in the Mitchell Green Lounge and the tentative schedule of planned events for the following academic year was discussed.

Events Planned for the Fall Semester:

• We would like to organize our first trip to a mosque in Boston, and possibly combine this trip with a visit to the local museum that features Islamic art. Ms. Tazim Kassam from Religion Department will help us to coordinate this event which will give us an opportunity to include other non-Muslim students in our activities.

• We ambitiously envisage that the highlight of this term would be an event tentatively called "Celebrating the beauty of Islam." We aim at presenting Islam, and Islamic culture to the Middlebury College community. If you want to help organize this event, please contact Fauzia Rehman or any of the other Board members!!!

• We are hoping receive an account on Midd-Unix soon, and this will enable us to start creating our own Islamic Society's Homepage. This will be the most effective way to "assert our existence" beyond Middlebury campus, and to make contacts with other Islamic organizations, primarily in Vermont and New England. Anybody interested in helping with this project, please contact Alexander Perjéssy.

• Not least importantly, starting this week, we will begin with regular Jumcah prayers. During our short informal meeting at dinner on Thursday (September 28) we agreed to meet each Friday from 2:30-3:30 p.m. (till October 27) and from 12:30 a.m.-1:30 p.m. from October 29 onwards in Mitchell Green Lounge which is located on the top floor of the eastern "tower" of McCullough.

The Friday Assembly (Jum'ah) Prayer: