Shabbir Mansuri was an average man who lived in US. One day in 1989, his daughter came home from school. She brought a textbook about religions.

Mansuri was curious. He read the textbook and found out that it did not explain Islam well. The book only contained three pages that did not explained about Islam well.

"It told religions without religions," Mansuri said during his visit to Republika on Friday.

Being disappointed with national standard of textbook, he found a Council on Islamic Education (CIE) that aimed to extend the view towards Islam and change the curriculum of education system in US in 1990 located in Fountain Valley. Sadly, he faced rocky roads in his way to strengthen the explanation of Islam in the textbook.

He came to every publishers in US. He tried to convince them about what should be in the textbooks of religions. But, no one heard since the label of any religion was sensitive issue in a secular country like the US. Not only that, he later learned that such the better way to approach the publishers was through a conference.

In 2007, he changed the name of CIE to Institute on Religion and Civic Values (IRCV). The move was believed to be in accordance with his mission to teach tolerance, pluralism, and the values of Islam. At first, he held a conference. It was attended by few people with various religions. "We didn't talk about Muslim at all," he said.

The thing got bigger. During the third conference, many people came. There were Latins, native americans, and others. Publishers came to the conference.

A year later, a publisher agreed to sign a contract with Mansuri. His dream came true. He provided the materials for textbook about religions. He successfully changed the curriculum. "Now there are 54 pages about Islam in the textbook," he said.

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