As a school, we felt the importance of being environmentally conscious. We believed this project would enable us to make our school more attractive while also maintaining the biodiversity of the local area. The hope was to create a garden that would allow us the opportunity to educate our staff, pupils and the local community about the importance of protecting our natural inheritance.

“And Allah has sent down rain from the sky and given life thereby to the earth after its lifelessness.

Indeed in that is a sign for a people who listen.” (Qur’an, 16:65)

The school held a competition amongst pupils to design plans for the garden. There were many entries and the three winners were selected by School Council members. The creation of the three garden plots was based on the winning designs from; Sadia Khanun, Zainab Saleem and Safaa Hussain. The winning designs were chosen for their creative and artistic layouts.

In the two weeks that followed, members of the Science club along with pupils from all year groups and teachers from across many departments gave up break and lunch times and worked tirelessly to help bring the plan to fruition. Pupils worked all week to make; bird feeders, a bird house, hanging baskets, portable wind mills, plant labels, party invites, bunting and decorative ornaments. And it is because of this, that we, at MIHSG thank all those that contributed to the building of the ‘Gardens of Jannah!’

To round off the hard an self-less work of all those involved, pupils planned and prepared an opening ceremony on Friday the 21st and invited staff and local residents to an ‘Alice in Wonderland’ themed party! A beautiful English tea-time spread was prepared with made a variety of delicious cupcakes, tea-time sandwiches, cakes and biscuits, with tea and coffee refreshments in the finest of china!

One of the local residents described the gardens as ‘an outstanding development’ whilst another described the girls as ‘a credit to the school’. And we wholeheartedly agree!

– Written by Students Council

Below is a snippet of her nomination:

Jamila Kossar is an active volunteer fundraiser having secured thousands of pounds for a range of charities including Islamic Relief and the READ Foundation. A teacher by day in Manchester, Jamila has devoted her spare time to charitable activities, organising the annual mountain trek up Mount Snowden, a 30 mile charity bike ride, a sky dive, a ‘walk to school/work’ day and recently supported 200 young girls to raise in excess of £7,000 in one week for orphans around the world. Within the local Manchester area, Jamila is part of a team of people who organise a monthly ‘feed the homeless’ event in the city centre. During Ramadan, this becomes a weekly event, enabling barriers to be broken and communities to come together as people from different faiths and backgrounds descend on Piccadilly Gardens.

“On behalf of everyone associated at MIHSG, we would like to congratulate Miss Kossar on her nomination.

May Allah reward her hard work and efforts with the ultimate of success in the hereafter, insha’Allah.”