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On 10th October 2004, Khawateen committee had organized a meeting inviting all jamaat chairladies and khawateen representatives from individual jamaats at Stanmore Hujjat Imambargah.
Purpose of this meeting was to familiarize the Chairladies with - Current Khawateen activities
- To introduce Khawateen Committee and their role within COEJ
- To encourage them to identify their jamaat women’s needs and liaise closely with the Khawateen chair and committee for appropriate support and means to provide those needs
- To appoint a khawateen representative from their jamaat to attend khawateen meetings who can then take a liaison role between jamaat and Khawateen COEJ and assist in promoting the programmes and activities that are carried out by khawateen and encourage active participation of our jamaat women.
Alhamdullillah we had a very positive response by active participation from UK jamaats. Apologies were given by Leicester and European jamaats. Watford jamaat participated with great enthusiasm as they had just joined COEJ as a member jamaat and inshallah khawateen will closely liaise with Watford chairlady to discuss the women’s needs of their jamaat. On 11th Dec 2004 meeting was organized between COEJ khawateen and WF Women’s Desk, mediated by Br Ahmad Dungersee, WF representative to COEJ. Alhamullillah positive views were exchanged with better and improved understanding of working relationship. A suggestion was forwarded to have representative from each board attending meetings to improve better communication and clarity on current women projects. Ladies Annual Sports Tournament: Summer 2004 tournament was held in Birmingham in July 2004 with participation of 180 girls/ladies from various jamaats within the UK. Sports played at the event were football, netball, table tennis, swimming and badminton. Alhamdullillah the event was successful. I urge all jamaats to encourage their sports team to actively participate in such events and have close liaison by attending meetings arranged to discuss the running of the tournament. Our thanks to Hydery jamaat for encouraging their ladies to participate after a two year break. Inshallah this year the 10th LAST will be held in Peterborough on 23/24th July 2005. Khawateen COEJ would like to thank Birmingham jamaat for hosting last year's tournament and thank Peterborough jamaat in anticipation for accepting to host the summer 2005 tournament. Young Girls Camp The launch of YGC was in June 2004. The camp was set up to aim at covering the age ranging from 8-11 yrs, focusing on bringing awareness amongst the girls reaching the Buloogh age. Alhamdullillah with 30 girls participating and 30 on the waiting list, last years camp in Portsmouth proved the need to have such activity for our younger age group. Having had a positive feed back and good success rate, khawateen will continue to run the 4 day camp inshallah annually during May half term holiday. This fun filled camp provides the opportunity for our girls to explore their identity, activate the learning process, making Islamic teaching more accessible at that young and tender age. Girls Camp The 5th Annual Girls Camp this year is still under discussion, aiming to hold in Portugal.
The aim of this camp is to provide opportunity for our youths age 11-16 to interact within the European jamaats and exchange ideas and enhance their Islamic values through experience. The camp covers Islamic perspective relevant to the age group. The camp is run for one whole week with strict timetable covering religious, cultural, educational and fun packed activities for our youths. Last year the girl’s camp was held in Zurich with around 28 participants. The theme was cultural values and girls had to adopt a granny. The idea was to value and experience the older generation within our community and through practical examples, share their daily needs and enhance their experience by practical duties of caring for the elderly. Khawateen committee would like to thank the 3 senior citizens who participated in the camp and shared their valuable time and experiences with the group. Bereavement Support Group BSG have been actively working in training group of volunteers within the jamaat to cater the needs of our community with regards to issues around supporting a bereaved. A team of lawyers are also working on training volunteers experienced in Law to be able to support the community with regards to issues around ‘Will and Finance’. Regular workshops and road shows are conducted throughout the year, covering various aspects of bereavement such as: Islamic law, Fiqh masaails/ ruling, befriending, counseling, will and finance etc. A booklet on code of conduct is under way to support the trained volunteers for practice guidance covering issues around safety, confidentiality, supervision and guidance in supporting the bereaved. Khawateen BSG has assisted Dubai in setting up similar group following the WF Dubai conference in Oct 2004. BSG is currently a member of Harrow churches based in North London, who offers training, supervision support to existing volunteers with a minimum fee and have also taken part in seminars and road shows delivered to our women within the community. An annual fee is charged for the membership and COEJ jamaats could benefit the training with a minimum cost. Hyderi and Leicester jamaat is due to be trained and inshallah this source will be used to carry out the training. BSG had seminars organized in Leicester and Peterborough jamaat during summer 2004. A seminar is booked on 5th Feb 2005 in Birmingham. Seminars were booked in Hyderi and Peterborough jamaat for Dec 4th and 11th 2004 but due to jamaats commitments these were cancelled. In the next 6 months, BSG will be working on getting all the trained volunteers together to evaluate the service provided to individual jamaats by the trained volunteers and evaluate the current status of their involvement within the jamaat. A booklet on Code of Conduct will be distributed amongst the volunteers with discussion for better and improved provision of services to the community. Women's Health Women’s health of khawateen is working closely with the HIB. A khawateen liaison attends the HIB meeting to inform and update women’s issues of our community and works closely to promote identified needs of our community women. Women’s health organized two half hour sessions on Breast Cancer Awareness delivered by sis Naseem Panjwani from Essex during the HIB screening in Portsmouth in Sept 2004 and in Peterborough 2004. A leaflet has also been designed for the above to provide information and advice to women on such issues. Khawateen has floated a questionnaire to the jamaat chairladies to be completed by the female members of our community so specified needs could be addressed. Future Projects - A youth co-coordinator has been appointed by the khawateen to actively liaise with the youth bodies across the jamaats to identify issues and needs of our young girls and women.
- Young Girls camp to be held in May half term 2005, venue yet to be confirmed.
- 10th Ladies Annual Sports Tournament to be held on 23rd and 24th July in Peterborough.
- Girls Camp in Aug 2005 venue Portugal?
- BSG, Positive Parenting and Women’s health seminars and road shows and training will be delivered through out the year at different venues and on jamaats request.
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