As the new Muslim and multi-faith advisor of the Tucker Foundation, Sharif Rosen will serve as a resource for students grappling with faith-based issues. Rosen, who joined the Tucker Foundation in December, provides support for the Tucker Foundation’s various multi-faith programs, including Tuesday evening multi-faith conversations and the Inter-Faith Living and Learning Community located on first floor of Rauner Hall.
Born to a Jewish father and a Catholic mother in a home where, he said, the discussion of spiritual issues was considered taboo, Rosen often yearned for the chance to explore his religious side freely. The moment arrived when he underwent a “spiritual journey” as an undergraduate at Loyola Marymount University.
“I was very fortunate that in my most reflective phase I actually began to meet Muslims who embodied the balance and humility and wisdom that I was seeking in my life,” said Rosen, a convert to Islam.
While an undergraduate, Rosen served as the community relations coordinator of the University Muslim Medical Association community clinic in south Los Angeles, an experience that he said taught him to listen and care deeply for others.
Most recently, Rosen served as student services director at the Qasid Arabic Institute in Jordan, where he worked with college students studying Arabic abroad.
Rosen said his experiences from his previous posts will help him guide students who may be fear navigating and embracing the questions they have about their own spirituality.
“I really saw the need to support students who in some way are outwardly quite successful but inwardly are quite conflicted,” he said.
Aside from his advising duties, which include Dartmouth’s Muslim Students Association, Al-Nur, he is currently translating a ritual prayer and purification book into English.
Rifat Zaman, a second-year student at the Geisel School of Medicine and a member of the search committee that selected the new advisor, said Rosen seemed willing to reach out to a broad group of students.
“I think he’s the sort of person who brings people together,” she said. “I hope he will be a catalyst for further dialogue and increased cohesion within the Dartmouth community and Al-Nur.”
Hamza Abbasi ’16, the president of Al-Nur, said Rosen’s accessibility and passion for service were clear and that he was a good fit for the College’s small but diverse Muslim community.
“He embodies the ideals of the community and of Dartmouth — just working by using your knowledge to improve your surroundings,” Abbasi said.
Rosen said that he and his family feel honored to be part of the pluralist discussions that he encounters in the area. He said he feels that his religion is often misunderstood in the media.
“We’ve never seen a community that’s so receptive to genuinely wanting to know us,” he said. “Dartmouth plays a large part in promoting that kind of ethos in the community.”
Rosen said multi-faith conversations allow members of the community to have robust discussions about religion and faith where no one is judged or put on the defensive. Such programs allow for the development of a basic kind of religious literacy that he said society lacks.
Rosen said he believes faith is a curative process, beginning with the self and gradually branching outward.
“Faith in general is about healing,” he said. “Healing oneself, healing with one’s neighbor and then healing communities as a whole.”
This article has been updated to reflect the following correction:
Correction appended: January 10, 2014
The original version of the article did not attribute the story to its correct author, Jorge Bonilla.
