As-salāmu ‘alaikum wa rahmatullāhi wa barakātuh.
By the permission of Allah, we find ourselves in a good position to start a school in Manchester.
We have been working hard to locate an adequate building. Our needs require us to take on a building large enough to accommodate a nursery, primary school and the current Saturday school; along with having the facilities to expand into a high school in the future. Such buildings do not come cheap, and the price to buy such a building would potentially cost us upwards of £700,000 in Manchester.
So we have decided to take the route of renting a building, locating a number of potential buildings that fulfil the above criteria. The rent falls between £45,000 and £55,000 per year for all of them.
The benefits of renting are that the upfront costs are low. It also allows us to make the building sustainable and workable, prior to asking for any large sums of money from the people; something that is a heavy burden and trust upon us. Obviously the disadvantages are that we would have to cover the rent costs every year. However if we have a large enough building with a decent number of children, then this cost will be serviceable.
The school will be run within the current charitable framework and will be fully independent and fee based. Although physically separate from the masjid, it will still be a part of the setup. There will be no single beneficiary of the fees, except the school and masjid as a whole and all praise is due to Allah.
We wish to follow the example of some of our noble brothers who have already set up a Salafi School with respect to their continuous striving to achieve high standards even in difficult circumstances. And we wish to make the school self-sustaining in the long term. However currently we would require some financial assistance in order to get this project up and running.
By Allah’s mercy we have established a weekend school. We started small, with a small group of committed brothers and sisters, who have worked tirelessly until the school was established. It is now able to sustain itself continue to serve the purpose it was intended for – to the best of our ability. However in order to get to this stage, then initially we had to invest around £3,000 into the building, and we have since continued investing into the masjid building, so that the building is safe, clean and an excellent environment for the children.
With the new building, then that investment will be much greater. We are looking into prior planning advice from Manchester City council. Once we are given an indication then we will submit a proper planning application, and draw up a contract to take on the most viable building.
We project that we will require approximately £21,000 just to take possession of the building. This is broken down as follows:
- A month’s deposit
- Three month’s rent (due to us being a small charity, with a low financial turnover)
- Solicitors fees
- Architect’s planning fees
- Miscellaneous costs
Once that is completed there will be a lot of work to be done on the inside the building, and for this then we would need to get the estimates before we can quote a figure. So we ask the brothers and sisters to aid this project financially and with raising awareness of this project. We will be updating this regularly with news on our progress. Please make du’a to Allah that he allows this project to succeed. Indeed without His aid, Permission and Mercy, then we wouldn’t be in this position. And we are forever in need of Him (Glorified Be He).
Please visit here for details on how to donate: http://salaficentre.com/DONATE/
