Liwaa'/Raayah Criteria [Shura]

[Muhammad Alshareef]

Bismillah.

I'd love to hear what you guys want to include in the criteria of which qabeelah is chosen to win the Liwaa cup/Raayah trophy.

Criteria fall into 2 categories:
Objective and Subjective.
Objective is purely mathematical: how many people attended a seminar, what percentage attended the exams.

For Liwaa': up to 350 students, after which the number does not weigh in on the competition. (Primarily Majd, Durbah, Shams, - and others who get into this zone this year, in sha Allah)
Raayah trophy: up to 250 students. (For everyone else)

Subjective is where I need your shura on. Many Qabeelahs are actually in the 'zone' of winning the Liwaa' or Raayah trophy, so we need more difficult criteria (in order to raise the game, and separate the outstanding from the excellent.)

So here is what I've got so far, let's see what you've got:


-- Support to other Qabeelahs (this is one of the biggest in my mind), the ability of a Qabeelah to win the hearts of other Qabeelahs, and to support their brothers and sisters in other cities.

(i.e. who wants to give the liwaa' to a city that their neighboring brothers and sisters think are arrogant and have been hurt by them! Durbah EXCELLED in this criteria, students from all around the world were voting for them.)

-- Profitability – the ability of the Qabeelah to keep costs lower, which ultimately strengthens the entire AlMaghrib non-profit system.
(Example, if a 250 student body rents a 180 thousand dollar hotel - I'm exaggerating here, so that you get the point. Sure the seminar will be grandiose, with strobing lights and all that, but eventually AlMaghrib and all other cities and students suffer because such a class takes this AlMaghrib non-profit project into debt.)

-- Swiftness of students (The speed at which students in that Qabeelah race to register for a seminar. A seminar that sells out 1 month before the upcoming seminar is way more exciting than a seminar that has empty seats)

You'll see QShams, LondonUK, excelled in this area.

-- Relative growth – the highest relative growth of the Qabeelah from the previous year. (So if a Qabeelah has built itself up from where it was, that surely should have more weight)

-- Community contribution and family ties – the effectiveness of the Qabeelah’s Chartiree projects and outreach to the Qabeelahs local community.

(This is another big one for me. What is the Qabeelah's 'family ties' position with their local community. Again Durbah excelled in this.)

-- Marketing creativity – the creativity of the Qabeelah in promoting and marketing the seminars and its projects.

(When a Qabeelah excels in exciting people to take studies of their Deen seriously, their marketing insights will be of benefit to others.)

[Muhammad Alshareef]

So what would you like to see the Qabeelahs focusing on to win the Liwaa' or Raayah?

[Muhammad Alshareef]

Ok, I would add:

-- Organizational Professionalism
(Cleanliness, starting/ending on time, students ushered smoothly, students coming back from break on time-not walking in late, distracting class. Etc.)

[Abd Al-Azeez]

Bismillāh wAlhamdulillāh was-Salātu was-Salāmu 'alā Rasūlillāh,

As-Salāmu ‘alaykum wa Rahmatullāhi wa Barakātuhū,

I believe the Qabeelahs ability to maintain AlMaghribs strength in it's local Islamic environment (i.e. how many other Islamic organisations are working in the city/how active they are/how well the Qabeelah is doing given the competition) should be taken into account.

This is not a theoretical category as in the case of QShams.

And Allaah knows best.

Wa ‘alaykum as-Salām Rahmatullāhi wa Barakātuhū.

[Ali 22]

Seminar Follow-up

the ability of a qabeelah to come together after a seminar and do productive activities that help their students to instil the knowledge learnt at the seminar and keep the brotherhood alive (i.e. study groups, sports activities, dinner/lunch outtings, halaqahs, etc)

[bint_habibullah]

^ Along with that idea I notice there are probably more volunteer activities and they're quite exclusive. Why not have a qabeelah get together? There are plenty of regular students who aren't volunteers. There are a lot of volunteer cliques from what I've seen.

Da'wah outreach to non-Muslims as a qabeelah.

[Muhammad Alshareef]

I guess the question is: "The ideal Qabeelah: what do we want it to look like and do?"

We are not trying to create new organizations within the Qabeelah, almaghrib's strength has always been in focusing on what it does best and strengthening (not clashing) with other Muslim organizations.

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Here's something I would add:
AlMaghrib Endowment Fund: A Qabeelah's love and support toward the larger vision of AlMaghrib.

For Liwaa' Cup specifically: Qabeelah's strength in keeping the students informed of AlMaghrib happenings. (In the Loop)

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Note: I'm pushing the limits of what a top class Qabeelah does so that we can give a 2 millimeter advantage to one over the other, to distinguish the best of the best from the best.

[Abd Al-Azeez]

JazakAllaah khayr, Shaykh.

Forgive me but I did not intend 'competition' with other organisations for the sake of clashing, rather that if there are numerous organisations offering seminars/retreats/study circles/weekend activities within one city, a successful and strong Qabeelah in such a city would, at the same time as maintaining good links with all other organisations, still improve and enhance it's presence and reach through it's inspiration and perspiration. This in itself is a significant milestone that should not be discounted from the criteria.

And Allah knows best.

[Muhammad Alshareef]

Also:
Qabeelah forum participation

[Munawwara]

This may sound a bit simple, but when me and my husband first attended the Al Maghrib seminars, we actively looked for 'welcoming personas' from the volunteers/staff - when we see lots of smiles from all the staff it illuminates the qabeelah and I believe this is a sign of strength.

Happy staff = happy audience = happy qabeelah = strong qabeelah.