Why Drost does this work:

Muslims believe that the first revelation given to Prophet Muhammed (peace be upon him) was to read. Education is not only our right as humans, but our responsibility to use as a tool to build understanding, community, and in time, collective liberation. I do this work to answer that call. To limit access to education, regardless of circumstance, is a loss for all humanity.

Biography:

Drost Kokoye joined THEI in August of 2022 as the West Tennessee Transitional Program Coordinator, and she became Transitions Manager in 2024. Drost is from Halabja, a city in the Iraq-occupied portion of Southern Kurdistan. She grew up in Nashville, Tennessee, in the American South. Even across continents, Drost is a girl from the South. As she grew up in the Muslim communities across Tennessee, Drost saw a lot of missing access points. She began organizing and worked to grow confidence in the power of community and advocacy at home. She was a founding board member of the American Muslim Advisory Council in 2012, an organization that was born after Tennessee Muslims defended their first amendment rights in the Tennessee Legislature during the 2011 session. Drost was appointed by Mayor Karl Dean as Metro Human Relations Commissioner 2012-2014. She completed a Bachelor of Arts from Middle Tennessee State University in 2014 with a focus on political science. Drost went on to do Know your Rights workshops and Get Out the Vote popular education sessions in Muslim communities across Tennessee in partnership with the ACLU of Tennessee in 2016.