The Al-Ghazali Youth club is one of the Al-Ghazali centre projects. It has been delivering recreational, motivational and educational support activities to local children and young people since 1992. The centre now owns its own building in the heart of the community in Liverpool 7 bordered by L8 and L15. Our youth club area is in the basement of our building. Our young people wanted to improve the condition of the youth club to make it bigger and in a better condition as the walls and floors had been hit by damp. They want it to accommodate the increasing number of users and have more activities to meet young peoples needs. There was a lot of disused space and the area needed work to improve the condition of the walls and flooring. Last year we were lucky enough to able to excavate unused space which doubled the size of the youth club area. We now need to work towards completing some of the other works, plastering of the walls, new flooring and introduce new stairs to basement.

What we'll deliver:

• Refurbish the area to become welcoming to people
• New flooring with rubber tanking
• Restored walls
• New stairs from basement area to reception area on ground floor

Why it's a great idea:

Our youth club delivers a vital service to the community, ensuring that local young people have a safe place to play, build relationships and receive the support they need to flourish in life and feel confident, happy and part of a community. Our project will increase the delivery of youth provision in the area for all young people but especially for young people from ethnic minority communities and Roma and Czech community which are all within the vicinity of the centre. Our youth club is over subscribed, the refurbishment of our expanded youth club will mean we can welcome more young people and increase the variety of activities to suit young peoples wants and needs. Our youth club contributes to preventing antisocial behaviour and gang culture on our streets. It also gives young people facing isolation and loneliness an opportunity to take part in local activities and supports members dealing with mental health issues. Members have opportunities to volunteer and gain employment.

Steps to get it done:

• Contractor on site to begin project
• Preparing walls and floors
• Plastering walls
• laying new flooring

Our youth club delivers a package of services to its young people, they don't just come and socialise but also receive support with school work, support with mental health issues especially after lock-down and young people will have to contend with the impact of Covid-19 on theirs and their families lives. As a member of the youth club young people can the access other services delivered by the centre such as the Supplementary school and the karate club and other projects. All our youth workers were once members who became volunteers and then gained employment with us, its our way giving back to our community.