Nadiyah Furqan, 18, in public wears head coverings and long, dark, loosely fitted garments — a look that easily identifies her as a likely member of the Muslim faith.
“We get a lot of stares,” Furqan said. “Sometimes I wish they’d stop staring and just ask us a question.”
Furqan, and other Baton Rouge Muslim teens, said they want other teenagers and adults of Christian faiths to understand them better and stop stereotyping them.
They see terrorists’ attacks as murder and say their faith does not remotely support such acts. Their faith teaches them the principle of peace (Salam), a term students use frequently in greeting one another, they said.
“My religion is a part of my life,” Furqan said. “We pride ourselves on being Muslim.”
Furqan graduated from Brighter Horizon School on May 10 and she plans to attend LSU and major in medicine or engineering.
Being part of a minority religion in Baton Rouge is challenging at times, Furqan said. But she is used to taking a stand. Her parents converted from Christianity to Islam years ago.
Many area Muslim teens attend religious and social events at the Islamic Center of Baton Rouge on East Airport Drive, where they also pray and listen to speeches on the tenets of their faith.
But teenagers will be teenagers, they said. Many students said they enjoy talking on the phone with their friends, meeting up in the mall, shopping at favorite stores, including Victoria’s Secret, watching movies, hanging out and just having fun.
Several Muslim teens said hardly a day passes when they aren’t asked a question about their Muslim faith or about the way they dress or how they feel about the violence in the Middle East.
What people may find different in Furqan’s school, Brighter Horizon School, is that it caters to a predominantly Islamic student body in grades pre-kindergarten through 12th.
Students gather and pray together daily in a carpeted room designated specifically for prayer.
Alicia Faical, 16, a Woodlawn High School student, chose to practice Islam. Her father is Lebanese and practices Islam. Her mother is Mexican and practices Catholicism.

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