How do you conduct a Literacy program for an entire community? Try opening a school.
Mount Hira School was established in Nellikuppam of Cuddalore District in the year 2017. To provide quality education, a school need well trained teachers. But how would you find them in a conservative town where ladies hardly complete schooling?
To solve this problem, Mount Hira School embarked on providing rigorous training to teachers through organizations namely: Xseed, Synergy, Organization of Muslim Educational Institutions and Associations of Tamilnadu (OMEIAT), iMax, Unity Public School, Understand Quran Academy and MIKids (A Phonics Based International Spoken English Programme). The parents have to help with homework and they too started learning along with their kids. The school has since conducted annual writing competition for the parents. This is how an entire community is participating in a literacy program.
The chairman of Mount Hira School, Engineer Ferozkhan, seeks to revive Islam’s glorious past through this institution. Doing so would mean going back to the way how our predecessors (salaf) learnt. Our predecessors didn’t distinguish between religious and secular sciences. On the contrary, their discoveries and achievements were inspired by the knowledge revolution that Islam brought. They learnt about Allah and then they learnt about his creation (astronomy, medicine, mathematics, language). Doing so was only natural.
His approach has borne fruit in a short span of time. Mount Hira School teachers has been shortlisted in Top 100 Xseed Schools in India among 75,000 teachers. Its students have secured top places in various national level arts competitions and international Qirat competitions.
The school currently has 242 students from KG to Grade 5 in a 5000 sq.ft own building (Phase 1). The school fee is kept affordable for all and starts at 15,000 Rs annually. Over the next 8 years, the school strength is expected to touch 750. The school will have until higher secondary with separate classrooms for boys and girls.
[Phase 1 Building]
‘The Nellikuppam Educational Trust’ governing the school have purchased a 1 acre land (45,000 sqft) 150 metres from Phase 1 since the current place is not suitable for expansion. The plan is to construct approximately 12,600 sqft at a cost of 3 Crores. They have already raised 1.2 Crores for the construction. The construction activity is estimated to take eight months. Two months post-handover, the school would start paying building rental to the investors.
The minimum investment is 5 lakhs. The investment will be used for the construction of the building. For 5 lakhs investment, the investor would be paid a monthly rental of 2500 Rs with 10% rental appreciation every two years (30,000 Rs per annum or 6% annual RoI). Investment lock-in period is four years.
The cost of construction increases about 6% every year. The building value depreciates about 3.3% annually.
The pay-out would look something like this for an investment tenure of 10 years. Do note that the school will start returning the investment by end of the 4th year.
Investment terms:
The investment can be given in installments on milestone completion or can be paid in one go.
Investment Security: The Nellikuppam education trust owns both Phase 1 and Phase 2. In case the school is unable to pay the investors, it will sell the phase 1 estimated at 80 lakhs to settle the dues. Phase 2 land has been purchased at a cost of 1.3 Crores.
ESAF Due Diligence:
- Project reviewed and approved by MD Thameezuddin, President of Parents Teachers Association, Government Muslim School, Chennai.
- Post-dated cheque available for investors.
- The academic partners of Mount Hira School are personally known to us.
Comments:
- If you have 5 lakhs in bank, this is a great investment opportunity for this world and the next. Your money will be used to educate the next generation of our community.
- Return on Investment (RoI) is on the lesser side and so are the risks. Despite being a social impact project, the returns are decent.
- We can arrange site trip to potential investors
