Masjid-e-Tauheed Youth Empowerment Scheme

In August 2023 we successfully ran a holiday club for children eligible for benefits-related free school meals. This was run under Newham's Holiday Activities and Foods programme and we had over 100 students attending daily. This was the first time a holiday club was open specifically for this demographic which was a welcome addition to the neighbourhood.

Nearly every single parent and child rated the club as excellent or good. Given the success of the club, we would like to extend these activities over the rest of the year through weekend youth empowerment clubs for boys and girls.

The youth club will provide children with a safe space to spend to give them new skills and new experiences. The youth club will focus on physical and enrichment activities to improve their health and well being, as well as developing life skills like cooking, self-defence, crime awareness, financial awareness and more. We will do this through activities and new experiences like residential retreats, farm retreats, snow camp, water sports and more.

There will also be a focus on giving back to the local community through looking after the elderly, street cleans and more which will give the children a sense of collective responsibility.

While we can dedicate some funding towards the project, we don’t have the complete funding to support a full year's provision. To ensure we can run this for the full year we are seeking some additional funding from Newham Council. Beyond this, we are hoping, like has happened with other schemes we have run, the community will see the benefit of these clubs and donate towards its running in future years.