The Team

Aspire is a voluntary committee comprising of young Muslim women from Luton who are actively involved in working with different communities.

The management committee comprises:

Fozia Irfan (Chair)
A founder member of the organisation, Fozia is a qualified solicitor with a background in employment law. She was brought up in Luton, attending Challney Girls High School and Luton Sixth Form College before completing a Law degree at the London School of Economics. Fozia has also been the overall supervisor of a number of the Aspire projects implemented and is consulted widely on community affairs in Luton.

With particular experience of educational and equality issues , she has served as a governor at Luton Sixth Form College and is a member of SACRE . She is also a scout leader and mother of three young children. In 2009 she was short listed as an Equality and Diversity Champion by the Bedford Race Equality Council.

Shahana Khundmir (Project Manager)
Shahana Khundmir grew up and was educated in West London. She completed a Computing degree at Brunel University, Middlesex before pursuing a career as a software developer. She moved to Luton in 2002 and is married with 3 children. She worked as a Project Officer on the Aspire Changing Voices project in 2007, and is currently working on the Leading Lights project. Shahana also runs a Swimming Club for children, and has been involved in various community projects and charities.

Samiya Rashid (Schools Liaison Officer)
Samiya has a bachelors degree in Middle Eastern Studies, and trained as a secondary teacher specialising in Religious Education. She was born and brought up in Luton attending Challney Girls High School and Luton Sixth Form College. She has since worked in Primary schools as an Ethnic Minority Achievement teacher working to improve skills of children with English as an additional language.

She is also a member of SACRE. Samiya is currently teaching numeracy to adults, based in primary schools across Luton with the aim of working towards getting adults to achieve essential maths skills to help further their own career, as well as gaining a greater understanding of how their children can be helped at home. In addition to this, Samiya has three young children of her own.

Shafina Ahmed (Secretary)
Shafina is a social care worker by profession, employed part time for the Borough Council working with the elderly. She is also a Governor of her local infant school and a volunteer Scout Leader. She has supported various community projects for adults and children and also helped in many fundraising activities for local charities.

Rozia Hussain (Treasurer)
Rozia has a background in funding, research, consultation and evaluation. She began her career at the University of Bedfordshire as a Researcher looking for funding opportunites, and monitoring and evaluating European-funded training programmes. Rozia also worked for the local Chamber of Commerce as a Development Officer, managing Policy and Representation. She then went on to work for the University of Central Lancashire as a Funding Officer.

Later she worked for an organisation known as 'KnowledgeNorthWest' which put businesses in touch with the academic expertise at the sixteen higher education institutions in the North West of England. More recently Rozia has been working for Aspire on the 'Women's project' and continues working in a voluntary capacity evaluating various projects. Rozia currently works for the Luton Cultural Services Trust analysing and evaluating local projects as part of the national 'Generations Together' programme.

Zareen Durrani (Project Manager)
Zareen has a batchelors degree in Psychology and has trained as a parenting workshop facilitator. She has volunteered within KS1 classrooms in schools such as Bramingham Primary School and Bushmead Playschool. She was born in Norway and grew up mainly in the southern state of Texas (in the USA), but also spent years in the Middle East in Doha, Qatar. Zareen has worked in Islamabad (Pakistan) for Pakistan Television Corporation in front of the camera in an IT based program for the younger genaration. Presently, Zareen is an Aspire project manager for a Luton high school based theatre project which highlights issues of identity, cultural diversity, racism, and citizenship.

Shabeena Khan (Volunteers and Outreach Co-ordinator)
Shabeena attended Challney Girls High School and Luton Sixth Form College. She went on to study International History at University and then trained as a teacher. She spent several years in London teaching History and returned to Luton to teach English at a local college. She is currently working as a Learning Officer for the museum service in Luton.

Shahida Khan (Executive Committee)
Shahida has been actively involved with the local Muslim community in Luton for over 30 years. She began her career by organising circles, camps and Eid parties for children. Shahida regularly attended events at local schools in order to talk to staff and children about Islam, and she has also previously been a high school governor. Later, she went on to manage a local Nursery which was highly regarded. In 2005, Shahida became a founding member of ‘Aspire' and played a critical role in encouraging other local women to become involved in this organisation. .

Afroz Nasiri (Executive Committee)
Afroz completed a Business Computing Systems BSc from The City University and worked in the banking sector as an IT Security Analyst. She moved to Luton after her marriage and began working on a number of community projects involving young people. She ran a number of study circles and mums and tots sessions before enlisting on the Eid Festival Project. She is currently also working as a Project Officer for a youth group called Hear My Voice and in addition is employed by Luton Sixth Form College as a faith advisor. She has two children and is studying for a Diploma in Counselling.

Educational Consultant: Naveed Mir
Naveed Mir was brought up in Luton attending Challney Girls High School and Luton Sixth Form College. She studied Law at University. During a gap year after graduation she worked in schools and subsequently decided to pursue a career in teaching. She has been teaching for eight years in inner city Primary Schools in Luton and Bradford, where she currently resides. During this time, she has worked as a Head of Year and Head of History. She is currently teaching Year 5 and is also the Head of Modern Foreign Languages, representing her school as part of an Arabic language initiative in Bradford.

Equalities and Diversity Consultant: Dr Nazia Khanum
Dr Nazia Khanum has an MA in Political Science and a PhD in History. She runs Equality in Diversity, an independent consultancy in equal opportunities management, research and training. She was Head of Equalities in five local authorities (GLC, Tower Hamlets, ILEA, Ealing and Bedfordshire County Council) and a Thinking Partner of the Department for Health's national programme - Race for Health. She is also a governor of Luton Sixth Form (Beacon) College, a board member of the local Learning + Skills Council (until 2007), a Non Executive Director of NHS Luton (Primary Care Trust), a Trustee and Chair of Luton All Women's (Vice Chair until 2008).

Her publications include academic and action research studies, guidelines, articles on various subjects including equality and diversity. She has extensively written on social issues nationally and internationally. Many of her recommendations published in 2008 in her research report on forced marriage, family cohesion and community engagement - national learning through a case study of Luton were picked up by the Home Affairs Committee report, 2008 on Domestic Violence, Forced Marriage (FM) and Honour-Based Violence (HBV) and also by a number of groups in Europe and beyond. Her latest research study on Forced Marriage - jointly carried out with the National Centre for Social Research for the Department for Children, Schools and Families was published on 2 July 2009.

One of her recently published research reports is a joint paper with Professor David Cheesman, ‘Soft' segregation: Muslim identity, British secularism and inequality, in Faith in the Public Realm - controversies, policies and practices edited by Adam Dinham, Robert Furbey and Vivien Lowndes (The Poly Press, University of Bristol, 2009). Her research study on Forced Marriage and Honour Based Violence in Oxford, August 2009, commissioned by Oxford City Council will be published in the near future. She is a member of the DCLG's National Muslim Women's Advisory Group and also a national Equality and Diversity Ambassador for the Equalities Unit of the Government.