The Bridge

In June 2000, Queen Elizabeth II opened the high-tech Millennium Bridge, which traverses the River Thames from the Tate Modern to St. Paul's Cathedral. Thousands of people lined up to walk across the new structure, which consisted of a narrow aluminum footbridge surrounded by steel balustrades projecting out at obtuse angles. Within minutes of the official opening, the footway started to tilt and sway alarmingly, forcing some of the pedestrians to cling to the side rails. Some reported feeling seasick. The authorities shut the bridge, claiming that too many people were using it. The next day, the bridge reopened with strict limits on the number of pedestrians, but it began to shake again. Two days after it had opened, with the source of the wobble still a mystery, the bridge was closed for an indefinite period.

Some commentators suspected the bridge's foundations, others an unusual air pattern. The real problem was that the designers of the bridge, who included the architect Sir Norman Foster and the engineering firm Ove Arup, had not taken into account how the footway would react to all the pedestrians walking on it. When a person walks, lifting and dropping each foot in turn, he or she produces a slight sideways force. If hundreds of people are walking in a confined space, and some happen to walk in step, they can generate enough lateral momentum to move a footbridge—just a little. Once the footway starts swaying, however subtly, more and more pedestrians adjust their gait to get comfortable, stepping to and fro in synch. As a positive-feedback loop develops between the bridge's swing and the pedestrians' stride, the sideways forces can increase dramatically and the bridge can lurch violently.

What does all this have to do with the Madressa? Quite a lot. We all need to choose which bridge we want to cross; the material man made bridge, which as illustrated above can be unstable and unreliable or the spiritual eternal bridge. We are all working together to disseminate His message and move along the bridge to achieve our ultimate goal. Daily, at a minimum ten times a day in salaat we recite in Sura Fateha, ayat 5, seeking Allah to guide us towards the right path. The Madressa represent this (spiritual) bridge and it is down to us, the Community, to ensure we continue to maintain and support it with the increased number of people attending on a weekly basis. We have collectively taken on the responsibility to get the pedestrians to the other side safely and more importantly to provide them with the appropriate and necessary toolkit to face the challenges of the world that we live in.

Those of you attended the ELC programme during the eve of 23rd night of Ramadhan, you will have witnessed recitation of the three suras by your children and students of the Madressa. I would like to thank all those who were involved in preparing the children for such excellent recitation. This continues to form part of the strategy of Madressa to improve and excel recitation amongst the children.

It gives me great pleasure to share with you another excellent round of GSCE results achieved by your children. In its fifth year at the Madressa the vast majority received an A* or A. The credit for the outstanding grades must go to the students and their parents and the hard work of their teachers.

Our online bridge of communication with students, parents, teachers and volunteers goes from strength to strength. It is one year since the launch of SIMOSS and with the blessing of the holy month of Ramadhan we launched online assessments for children of 9 years onwards. This captures two thirds of the SIM student population. Students can undertake these from the comfort of their homes and is graded instantaneously on submission.

Another extension to the offering by the Madressa is to provide professional development programme for the undergraduates. This goes live on 1st November and will provide you with an update in future bulletins.

Most of you may be aware that the Shia Ithna Asheri Madressa is marking the milestone of reaching 25 years and we will be celebrating this momentous occasion on the 13 December 2009. More details are mentioned in this article. Keep an eye out for announcements for the programme details. Please accept this as a personal invitation and we are looking forward to seeing you all at the ceremony. Lets us collectively pray that we can transport the pedestrians over this bridge for the next 25 years, Ameen!

Principal of SIM

S I Madressa Silver Jubilee

With the 25th anniversary, S I Madressa (London, Stanmore) has this year reached yet another milestone in its history.

Few people realise how far the Shia Ithna'asheri Madressa has come in such a short time, or what an impact it has made on our community here and further afield. From relatively modest beginnings it has flourished into the industrious organisation it is today. This history of the Madressa serves to illustrate what has been achieved so far, and is a tribute to all those whose ideas and efforts have gone into building a healthy future for generations to come.

On 13th January 1985, the London Jamaat first opened the doors of the Shia Ithna'asheri Madressa. Its main aim was to meet the growing religious needs of the children of our community. The Sunday classes were held at the newly-acquired Huseini Shia Islamic Centre in Stanmore, and consisted of a mere five classes and 60 students learning an elementary syllabus. Yet, in under a month the number of students had increased to over a hundred, and within a year there were 15 classes and over 250 students on register, and an established syllabus had been put into place.

As the Madressa grew, so did the efficiency with which it ran. In 1987 the Madressa began the process of computerising administrative data, and took the important decision to become a self-financing body with the introduction of a voluntary tuition fee. The Madressa teaching syllabus also underwent a comprehensive revision in the taught subjects of Tareekh, Fiqh, Akhlaq and Holy Qur'an. These subjects still remain at the core of the of the Madressa system today.

With the continuous growth the community took the view to move out of the centre in Stanmore to Priestmead School in Harrow. By 1988, the Madressa had grown to 380 students and moved to occupy larger premises at Park High School in Harrow. In the next few years, there was a general increase in the size of the community taking Madressa to a peak of 500 students at Park High.

The 1990s heralded the expansion of the Madressa on new fronts, both within the educational structure and in extra-curricular activities. The Madressa introduced teacher training workshops and awareness seminars to improve teaching and communication skills. Not only were these new pursuits of educational value, but also promoted community participation in many extra-curricular activities. These included annual sports days and annual activity trips.

In 1998, the Madressa was able to return to the renovated Husseini Islamic Centre in Stanmore, and today occupies all the available classroom space at the Centre together with the additional portakabins that you see in the car park.

Today the Shia Ithna'asheri Madressa boasts over 160 teachers and volunteers, some 38 classes and over 800 students. The age of this Madressa resonates an interesting observation; past students are now parents, teachers and in fact one of them has been a principal of this Madressa.
Until today the Madressa has maintained the core disciplines of Akhlaq, Fiqh, Quran and Tareekh. Other facets introduced are Arabic and Farsi languages, Islamic Studies GCSE, Professional and Personal Development classes for the senior students, specialist focus for those requiring learning support, SIM Cares to raise awareness in our children of the plight of the needy and Muslim Mum's magazine.

At this juncture let's not forget this community Madressa would not be what it is today had it not been for the parents of the students. In the hectic pace of today's society, we find we have less and less time for those important things. Many of us make the mistake of leaving Madressa to teach our children the basic essentials of Islamic life - when in reality these can only be taught at home and merely reinforced in the Madressa.

Our Madressa is recognised as the driving force amongst other Madaris world-wide with the syllabus having been adopted by many other Madressas across the globe. We even have had requests from non Khoja communities in Germany, Italy, Denver (US), etc. The teaching material is constantly being revised to keep it up to date, and new teaching methods introduced. Every year the Madressa produces core notes for students. The teachers use this as a basis to prepare for their classes together with research they undertake around the subject matter. This is a stark difference to when Madressa started when only a syllabus existed but each teacher had to produce his/her own set of notes prior to teaching. One of the key objectives of this institution is to maintain updated notes to move with the times.

In the e-age that we live in the Madressa provides students worldwide free access to the teaching material and manuals via its dedicated website. As the Madressa classes are formally limited to Sundays in 2008 it launched the first of its kind Online Collaboration System allowing to stay in contact with the students when they are not in Madressa with assessments, communications and monitoring of quran and salaat recitation. This positions the Madressa well in today's age where secular schools are maintaining contact with their students outside school hours.

The Shia Ithna-asheri Madressa is the pride of this community and a tribute to the vision and foresight of those who saw its usefulness all those years ago.

We have all been very fortunate to be provided with this noble opportunity to be guardians of your children and thank you all for placing your trust in us to propagate His religion.

May Allah bless all those who have given their time and effort in any capacity, both in the past and present and pray that they continue for the next 25 years to help in imparting knowledge about His religion to our children.

To celebrate the Silver Jubilee, a programme is going to be held on Sunday the 13th December 2009 at the Hujjat Centre (Stanmore), Inshallah.

SIM Quran Reciters on the 23rd night of Ramadhan in ELC

It is 9 months since SIM started to maximise the potential of our community"s children by encouraging a group of students who had achieved a good knowledge and understanding of tajweed and makharij to embark on the next level for them – tarteel. Tarteel means the recitation of quran in a melodious flow.

SIM introduced Quran Tarteel Class for certain students who showed great potential in this area. Alhamdulillah, with the continuous efforts of students, teachers and parents, the classes are running well and we have seen good results over the month of Ramadhan where SIM was given another opportunity to prepare these students for Quran and dua recitation.

On the 23rd night of Laylatul Qadr, 3 students from the SIM Tarteel Group were selected to recite Surah Ankabut (Maisam Merali), Rum (Zamin Manji) and Dukhan (Mehdi Reza Lilani). The boys performed very well in such a senior and public environment and excelled in demonstrating application of their knowledge. Feedback from ELC organisers was as follows

"On behalf of the ELC Team, I would like to thank the Madressa for providing such a high standard of Qur'an recitation during the A'maal of the 23rd night of the month of Ramadhan in the ELC. The reciters were fluent, expressed good knowledge of tajweed and recited at an appropriate pace. We pray that the Madressa is able to keep up its good work in training the children of our community and continues to use the ELC platform as an opportunity for the high achievers"

SIM would like to acknowledge the efforts of the children and the parents' support, and is grateful to Hujjat EC / ELC for their continued support by providing such a platform, teachers and parents for their time and selfless efforts in achieving this high standard.

GCSE and AS levels at SIM

By the grace of Almighty Allah, the Madressa has completed teaching its fifth batch of students in the GCSE Islamic Studies modules. The Madressa works in close conjunction with the Islamic Education board of the World Federation in the preparation of material and revision sessions and recently played an instrumental role in shifting to an alternative examination board that was deemed by our teachers to be more appropriate for our students.

The continued hard work of our students has ensured that they have continued to do well. We thought we would give the boys and girls who sat the exams this summer to say it in their own words:

Ibtehal Manji 13A:
"I found the Islamic Studies GCSE course interesting and enjoyable; we not only learnt about Islam but we also developed various skills along the way, such as explaining an argument convincingly but also succinctly. A variety of topics are covered, therefore maintaining my interest throughout the course. Although there is less lesson time spent on this GCSE than other GCSEs at school, the course was not particularly challenging; In fact, it was made all the more easier due to the fact that we started a year earlier so that we could focus on Islamic Studies when it came to exam time. If there were areas we were unsure about, the teachers were approachable and willing to help, so any issues were quickly resolved. On the whole, it was an extremely enjoyable course and I definitely do not regret it!"

Salman Pirmohamad 13B:
"Throughout my time while studying Islamic Studies at Madressa for GCSE's I have learn many invaluable skills. Firstly, Islamic studies taught me about not only the Muslim view of Islam but the worldly view of it i.e. how other people in the media today see Islam. Furthermore, my time in the classes has taught me how to support my view when asked challenging questions regarding my religion. For example, in last year's paper we were asked to explain 'why there is suffering in the world if god is merciful.' During the classes we have also learnt exam techniques that we could implement in our other various exams that we were taking. The teachers are excellent as is the level of organisation and I would also recommend this course to everyone in Year 10 and 11 GCSEs. "

Fatemah Zahra Somji 13A:
"I started my Islamic studies course in 2008 my unit K started off really badly, at first the whole course was extremely new and different, for me and it took me quite a long time to get into it in my first ever practise mock I got less than 50% which was quite sanding. However with this result I was navigated by my teacher in what I was doing wrong and helped me at an individual level to understand what the question is asking and how to answer. The result was amazing the next mock I got 98%. And finally ended up with 100% and the transition from unit K to unit D was easy as I stayed with the same teacher because I was used to her teaching style. On top of all this the material that was given to the students taking part was absolutely amazing especially when there was an event in which the students were invited to the Dar-ul-tableegh to be enhanced in our knowledge by one of the examiners Tabassum aunty. The Islamic studies GCSE was a great asset into booting my GCSE grades on the whole. I gained a lot of knowledge and experience and I would advise anyone who has the chance to do Islamic studies. "

Ali Nurmohamed 13B:
For me, the experience of taking the Islamic studies course had its ups and downs. It's not necessarily an easy exam to take. The fact that the majority of people at this madressa who take the course acquire A's and A*is because of not only the hard work of the teachers, but also because of their own hard work. I started off with the attitude that it would be the easiest GCSE to take. Getting a C first time round in the first unit was not something I expected. However, I only had myself to blame. It was sort of like a wake up call. After speaking to my teacher and a few other teachers, they guided me and made sure that I worked and did not repeat the same mistake. I decided to retake the unit along with the second unit. Thankfully I got an A in the end. However this proves that if you want to do this subject you must be prepared to work.

The Madressa will Insha Allah look to continue to teach students in the GCSE Islamic Studies units this year. We also looking at introducing the AS level in Islamic Studies and would encourage not just AS level students but also young adults to consider attending the sessions.

SIMOSS – 1st Anniversary- September 2008-September 2009

Towards the end of 2008, S I Madressa introduced a new phase in its teaching process by introducing SIMOSS. The idea behind this online collaboration and virtual learning environment was to transform certain operations within SIM and this platform was about to open up doors to take SIM to the next level. Following its introduction and inception, SIMOSS has become part and parcel of the system.

Probably being a ground breaking one in the Khoja Madaris world, the system has made internal procedures more effective and efficient, and enhanced our services and communication.

The aim was to launch some basic elements of the system and then gradually increase its components and the usage as well as the uptake. The platform has enabled a central repository of our resources, easily accessible by appropriate target audiences. We have also witnessed a smoother flow of sharing internal data and information. Departments are using the specific areas for their weekly planning and task lists. Furthermore, Salaat and Quran charts are managed electronically and the submission does not require physical presence, rather it can be submitted even if you are several thousand miles away from home. There is an increasing number of assessments and assignments being launched online, and this year's Term 2 test was fully online for all classes (ages 9 to 15yrs). The most recent feature is the Students Report online. This recently launched dashboard gives parents and students access to current as well historical data, enabling them to keep track of the charts and other records over a longer period in time. This would provide the facility to analyse the performance and identify areas for improvement, all this with a press of a button.

As we can see, the initial 52 weeks have seen an ongoing development of the system, and many more aspects are yet to be unveiled, Inshallah. It was mentioned at the outset that the value of the system was dependant to a large extent on how we all – admin/teachers/ students/parents – embraced and used it to its optimum. Twelve months on, we witness that the majority of the SIM community actively makes use of SIMOSS, contributing to its ongoing success.

SIM Personal & Professional Development Programme

"Tell me, and I will forget. Show me, and I may remember. Involve me, and I will understand."

Summary

SIM piloted a new initiative starting October 2007 for boys aged 16-19 - Madressa Personal & Professional Development (MPPD). After a successful pilot run in the first year SIM leadership decided to extend the Programme to a 2yr scheme which ended in May 2009. SIM is now looking to target a mature audience and cater to the needs of the 20-25yr age group – university students in their final 2yrs of study and recent graduates (we are happy to consider students outside of this age category as long as we think they can benefit from the course).

What is the purpose of MPPD?

MPPD was designed to equip students with certain critical life skills, provide a platform to engage in spiritual introspection and also address the challenges they face as young Muslims. The ultimate objective being that they become well-rounded ambassadors of our faith and community when they are at university and in their professional lives.

Who is the core team?

The core team of facilitators are Gulamabbas Lakha, Munir Chandoo, Mustafa Lalji and Ali Poptani – between them, they have over 40yrs of professional experience.

What is the focus of Year 1?
Over the two terms we will Inshallah introduce a range of core life skills – Leadership, Team Building, Time Management, Debating/Analytical, Presentation and Public Speaking. We also introduce a process of Self-Analysis of one's inner strengths/weaknesses and goal setting encompassing spiritual, personal, family, health, academic and career goals. Another component of MPPD has been how to write effective cover letters/CVs, preparation for interviews and corporate assessment centres. The focus has been to equip students with the know-how by providing "experiential learning" (learning by doing) and we have tried to make the classes as interactive as possible.

What is the focus of Year 2?
We will have more advanced leadership/management games/training; we will introduce negotiation skills; there will be an extension of Self-Analysis as this has proved to be very popular amongst prior students, with an emphasis on practical spirituality in the work place; there will be more of a focus on current affairs issues pertinent to young Muslims including training for debating skills; we will introduce a business game which will be run over a series of weeks requiring students to take part in a business simulation whereby they have to trade with customers and competitors, understand how to build long term relations, manage their cash flows and accounts and also apply Islamic business ethics. In the final week the teams will pitch their business to a venture capitalist using powerpoint presentations in a Dragon's Den environment. In Year 2 there is also a stronger emphasis on career planning and one to one assistance/guidance to help students gain work experience and also for recent graduates to leverage off the network of professionals in our community.

What expectations do we have of students?
We understand that we cannot set regular out of class assignments as students in the 20-25yr age group are under time constraints with their own academic/work commitments. Instead, we expect them to show enthusiasm and a positive, pro-active attitude in the sessions. Our basic expectation is that they show continuity in attendance, are punctual every week and adhere to a business dress code. We have formalised this commitment in the form of a facilitator-participant agreement which is signed by everyone on the first day of Term 1. The course is run over 2 years and follows the academic year. We are aware that university students may face exams early in the new year and in the summer term so we schedule our sessions accordingly. The course has 2 terms in each year and each term runs for around 6-8 sessions. Each session lasts around 90 minutes on a Sunday morning at Stanmore Madressa.

Muslim Mums – Issue 8

In this issue there are many features and to highlight a few, we have:

The Balancing Act: How to juggle the different facets of life
Goalsetting for Mums
Motivating your Older Child to Study

And a lot more!

Download your e-copy in Muharram from www.madressa.net

2009 / 2010 Dates for your diary:

Sunday 1st Nov 2009 – Sunday 22nd Nov 2009 - 3rd Term tests
Sunday 29th November 2009 – Madressa closed for Eid-ul-Haj
Sunday 6th December 2009 – Madressa open

Sunday 13th December 2009 – Eid e Mubahila / Madressa Silver Jubilee Celebration / Annual Presentation Day

Sunday 20th December 2009 – Madressa closed for Muharram / Christmas Holidays