Our News

20th September 2023 We are thrilled that chess is still going on at Alsama! After our amazing volunteers, George and Tom, left Alsama, they left their imprint behind, igniting a love for chess among the students and leaving them to take the lead.

5th September 2023 On Monday,28th of August, the Alsama family welcomed four wonderful new volunteers: Evie, Samuel, Laura, and Harriet. All of them are working on development strategies. We are very glad to have them with us.

30th August 2023 A big Congratulations to all our remarkable students for completing this year with flying colours! We all are very proud of you.

25th July 2023 Evaluation time! We have come to the end of the year and all of Alsama's 3 schools will be evaluated, students, teachers, staff, and cricketers!

21st July 2023 The first graduate student at Bourj Al Barajneh school, Mariam! Mariam's dream has come true. She has successfully finished her journey as a student, completing the first step towards achieving much more.

21st June 2023 Growing the Alsama Studio … The Alsama Studio is a social enterprise which is financially independent of Alsama. Recently, they welcomed a new volunteer - and another student!

14th June 2023 Alsama’s Running Club Alsama now has its very own running club - a group of dedicated students who meet with Coach Ali and volunteer Max Willis twice a week.

2nd June 2023 Chess Competition between Alsama and Brummana! On Wednesday 31st May, Alsama students travelled to Brummana to participate in a Chess competition ...

30th May 2023 Hiking at Alsama Alsama, supported by the Altenburg Foundation, has introduced hiking...

14th May 2023 Alsama Students Teaching Art! Fatima and Israa have recently started teaching art to other students in Alsama...

6th May 2023 Alsama Film Watch the Alsama Film, a short documentary made by Alsama in collaboration with Toy Soldier Films.

5th May 2023 Opera at Alsama! Opera returns for the third time at Alsama!

4th May 2023 Opening of Shatila 2! On Monday 3rd April 2023, Alsama’s 3rd school opened its doors to students for the first time!

16th March 2023 Tales of Art! Art and opera at Alsama!

16th March 2023 Nour’s Fundraiser for Bourj 2! Our Head of Communications, Nour, is raising funds to support illiterate students at our new Bourj institute…

27th February 2023 Poetry and Critical Thinking Recently, Alsama welcomed Max and Stanley, who are delivering lessons in poetry and critical thinking to our students.

23rd February 2023 Chess at Alsama! Exciting things are afoot in our Shatila and Bourj institutes … ♟

2nd November 2022 Equality in Cricket The theme for this week at Alsama: Equality in Cricket! 🏏

27th October 2022 Awareness Sessions for Dads Our awareness sessions have proved so popular that we decided to offer them to men in the community too!

27th October 2022 Evaluation Time Evaluation might sound boring but it helps us achieve exceptional results!

20th October 2022 Creative Fusion! Over the past two weeks we have been lucky enough to host two very special guests from Women Win. With their help our students in Bourj have been showing off their creative talent!

27th July 2022 Highlights of an incredible year We have achieved all our milestones for this year! Kickstarting our new Bourj institute, adding 3 new cricket hubs, launching Alsama/tech classes and much more. Our goals for next year are more ambitious but we need your help to reach them. Consider supporting Alsama to help us make a meaningful difference in the lives of young refugees.

25th July 2022 Final examinations time Our students are sitting the Cambridge English and UK Maths assessments this month to evaluate their growth in a year and progress to the higher group.

14th July 2022 100% success in Brevet exams Despite challenges faced in Lebanese afternoon school for Syrians, all our students passed the Brevet with flying colours!

25th June 2022 Alsama in Colors! Alsama walls are full of bright colors now! Led by our students with support of our French friends, we have painted Alsama principles on our school walls. Check out the super cool photos of our artists at work.

20th June 2022 Become a subscriber to ensure continuity This World Refugee Day pledge $120/month to support refugee development and become a subscribed donor at Alsama. We are providing quality education to teenagers and keeping them away from work and early marriage. Alsama is here to stay!

15th June 2022 Successful first year at Brummana High School Aseel and Lujain, first Excellence Fund cohort, finished their year at Brummana High School with outstanding grades, awards and well wishes from the BHS community. Click to know more and to support them for next year.

13th June 2022 Hugs and tears: Alsama Cricket Championship ends Month long matches successfully completed amidst smiles and tears. Our values of gender equality shone brighter than ever in the championship! See the infographic inside to know how we are increasing female participation in cricket.

23rd May 2022 Can yoga take you to the moon? In our Bourj class it can! With support of Tools For Inner Peace, we are teaching English through yoga. Every week we enact an English story through different poses and today we went on a “Mission to the Moon”.

16th May 2022 A mentally healthy library! Alsama library now has a mental health corner. Find a spot here if you want to be a know-it-all on this theme!

10th May 2022 Butterfly hugs and deeper breaths with Alsama Psychologist Our in-house psychologist, Faten Saleh, organised a series of mental health awareness sessions this month, covering techniques to deal with stress, panic and anxiety.

18th April 2022 Excellence Fund- A year in review with our community Our Excellence fund first cohort shared their highs and lows from the first year at Brummana High School with the donor community and learnt to "focus on the wins" for the term ahead!

11th April 2022 3 day yoga workshop for new yoga teacher trainees 6 Alsama students are training to be yoga teachers and will soon join our fully trained instructor cohort! Thanks Tools for Inner Peace for setting them off on this journey.

7th April 2022 Alsama student becomes cricket coach! Abdallah is the first Alsama student who has become a cricket coach. He is now the head coach of our newly opened hub in Bourj al- Barajneh, sponsored by MCC Foundation.

1st April 2022 Excellence Fund students launch crowdfunding campaign Hadeel, Shahed, Lujain and Aseel, our 2022-23 cohort of students joining Brummana High School, launched a campaign to raise their school fees. Show them your support!

29th March 2022 A beautiful documentary by the MCC about their visit to Alsama "I have never seen one where there is such a focused unrelenting commitment for the long term to make a difference to the lives of young people through education and sport." Guy Lavender, CEO of the MCC

25th March 2022 Welcome to our new Bourj al-Barajneh Institute! In company of foreign journalists and Alsama's friends, we opened our second teenager education institute in Lebanon in Bourj al-Barajneh.

15th March 2022 Alsama students performed an Opera! Our students explored their opera singing talents with visiting tenor Maximilian Fane and performed "Dalia", the story of a Syrian refugee girl with love for cricket.

10th March 2022 Happy Teachers’ Day from Alsama! Alsama Director Kadria distributed sweet surprises to all our teachers. Each slice included a personalised note.

6th March 2022 Alsama/tech is now in the classroom! Alsama/tech, our digital literacy project, has been launched with an expanded capacity and bigger goals!

1st March 2022 Smiles and Success: MCC Foundation visit to Shatila A wonderful week spent with MCCF, full of cricket, poetry, food and fun.

16th February 2022 Welcoming the Alsama Communications team We are thrilled to introduce the first ever Alsama Communications team. On board we have Mahmoud Amjd Suliman and Nour Alissa supporting us with all internal and external communication.

2nd February 2022 Our Excellence Fund students complete a term at Brummana High School Aseel and Lujain, our star students, have completed their first term at a "Top 10 Middle East School” (Spears Schools Index), Brummana High School.

31st January 2022 Kickstarting new Alsama Cricket hubs in Beqaa 2022 for Alsama Cricket started with the opening of 2 new cricket hubs in Beqaa. Thanks to the support of MCC Foundation we now support 320 players in 8 cricket hubs across Lebanon!

23rd January 2022 Students portray their photography talent in an online exhibition In collaboration with the Friedrich Naumann Foundation our students participated in a photography workshop and the best pictures of their project were displayed in an online exhibition.

19th January 2022 Unveiling of Alsama’s library transformation Students and teachers alike were delighted to return to Shatila's education institute after the break to discover a completely transformed library.

14th January 2022 Alsama kickstarts 2022 with a week of Collective Theme Based Learning During the first week of term Alsama's students in Shatila and Bourj el Barajneh joined their efforts to discuss how to tackle basic health issues.

14th January 2022 Alsama Cricket curriculum development Alsama’s senior cricket coaches from across all 9 cricket hubs gathered together in the first week of term to put next year's training programme in place.

17th December 2021 Students stock up on library books for the holidays Students eagerly queued up along Alsama's corridors to take library books home for the holiday. For some students, this was a first peek into our recently expanded library collection which is currently undergoing a transformation.

13th December 2021 New Cricket Coaches Alsama students take to the pitch to learn how to become cricket coaches. An article by Nour Al Issa, student and member of the Excellence Group at Shatila's Education Institute.

10th December 2021 Alsama’s Got Talent celebrates International Human Rights Day Students have been working hard to prepare their own International Human Rights Day-themed performances. From slick choreography to impressive raps and speeches - Alsama's students expressed what human rights mean to them.

25th November 2021 Students mark beginning of 16 days against Gender-Based Violence Celebrations took place in Shatila and Bourj el Barajneh to mark the beginning of 16 days of international activism against gender-based violence with students performing captivating poetry, spoken word and plays written by themselves.

18th November 2021 Alsama students are receiving their COVID vaccination 💪 ‘All vaccines are designed to protect against diseases, so get vaccinated to protect yourself and others.’ Aseel Suleiman, Alsama Excellence Scholarship recipient. 

18th November 2021 Shatila’s Tigers beat Bourj’s Lions The Finals of the Alsama Lebanon Cricket Championship2021 have taken place. Over the past six weeks 22 teams from the Shatila and the Bourj al Barajneh camps in Beirut and The Bekaa valley have battled it out to reach the finals.

17th November 2021 We held our 1st International Poetry Competition in Shatila We held Alsama‘s first international poetry competition. Students from our institutes in Bourj and Shatila wrote poems in English and then performed them in front of an audience with guests from Belgium, Germany, Denmark and the UK.

19th October 2021 Alsama creates innovative curriculum based on UN Sustainable Development Goals Alsama developed what we call “Collective Theme-Based Learning” (CTBL) objectives. Our CTBL Objectives are linked to the UN Sustainable Development Goals such as Affordable & Clean Energy (solar powered-electricity example) and No Poverty (balanced family budget).

25th September 2021 Alsama/tech has been launched! Alsama's IT and Coding boot camp, Alsama/tech, has launched. Canadian coder Gareth James is running a three week pilot programme with 50 of our students in Shatila.

25th September 2021 How cricket teaches kids in Lebanon’s refugee camps to dream big Lebanese news channel 'Beirut Today' visited us in Shatila. They interviewed our cricket players, students, teachers and coaches, and made a beautiful 5min documentary about our work. Watch it here.

25th September 2021 Solar Panels for Alsama in the Shatila and Bourj camps Due to the current electricity crisis in Lebanon, our schools had no power over the last couple of months. So our students decided that we should go green. Global trading company Montfort made the installation of solar panels on our rooftops possible.

29th July 2021 Friedrich Naumann Foundation supports Alsama Our students asked for a parental awareness course. Thanks to the support of the German Friedrich Naumann Stiftung we are now able to develop this important programme.

29th July 2021 Highest possible mark for learning environment in Alsama’s secondary institute in Shatila A third party assessed us according to international standards back in November 2020 - school culture, teachers and students. Then they returned in July '21, and were impressed by our students' progress.

9th June 2021 CNN highlights the works of Alsama’s embroidery artisans Since August 2020 Alsama Studio is collaborating with Swiss - British designer Larissa von Planta to create sustainable, wearable works of embroidery art.

9th June 2021 Alsama girls are speaking out against child marriage 'My advice to all girls is not to think about engagement and marriage before the age of 20.‘ Abeer, 18

9th June 2021 Empowerment and Cricket Galore We have opened a new teenager girls empowerment centre for 100 students in the Bourj al-Barajneh camp and a third cricket hub for 40 new players in Shatila. Thank you to the Dutch organisation Women Win and the British MCC Foundation.

29th April 2021 Alsama Cricket has its own logo We are over the moon to announce that our cricketer now have their own logo. We can't wait to see this logo on the international cricket world stage one day. Click on the photo to see the logo in its full glory.

19th April 2021 45 foreign volunteers give weekly zoom lessons We have 45 foreign volunteers from 19 different countries working with us. The volunteers give weekly English reading classes, English conversation classes and English poetry classes to our students via zoom.

21st March 2021 Ghadeer makes headline news in France Ghadeer Awad is one of three Alsama students who are now working as fully certified yoga teachers in Shatila. This week she was interviewed by France 24.

5th March 2021 UK’S MMC Is Supporting New Alsama Cricket Hub We have opened our 6th cricket hub in Lebanon, in the middle of three tent camps in Al-Marj in the Bekaa. Many of the new cricketers are also attending our Women Win supported Empowerment Centre.

31st January 2021 Alsama Cricketers Make their International Media Debut Cricketers Louay, Amani and Maram - alongside cricket director Richard Verity and coach Mohammad Hariri - were interviewed on the British sports podcast 'Oborne And Heller on cricket'.

17th January 2021 Three Alsama Students Graduate as Yoga Instructors Congratulations to three of our students in Shatila - Misra, Nabela and Ghadeer - who have completed their Yoga teacher training with Yoga NGO Koun in Beirut.

7th December 2020 First Secondary Education Institute for Refugees in Shatila In November 2020 the Alsama teenager education institute opened its doors to 180 boys and girls aged 12-24 in Shatila. It's the first secondary education institute in the camp.

24th November 2020 We have opened an Alsama Girls’ Empowerment Centre in the Bekaa After Shatila, the Girls' Empowerment Centre in al-Marj in the Bekaa valley next to the Syrian border is Alsama's 2nd centre.

29th September 2020 Alsama Shatila Students Receive UK Scholarships Three of our top students - Aseel, Hadeel and Lujain - have received scholarships to attend Bishopstrow College in the UK for the full academic year 2020/21 online. We are so proud of the girls!

4th September 2020 Our Beirut Crisis Response is Continuing Over the last 18 days the Alsama team has repaired 18 homes in the Bourj al Hamoud and Naba areas in Beirut. Thank you to Peaceland Foundation and Common Future for giving us this opportunity to help people in need after the harbour explosion.

13th August 2020 Girls Flying High Since the beginning of the year we have kept our education programmes in Lebanon going without missing a day. The Alsama programmes run 50 weeks in a year.

11th August 2020 Our Team in Beirut is Responding to the Crisis Since last Wednesday, the Alsama team, including cricket coaches, teachers and Alsama students, have been helping Lebanese families whose homes were destroyed by the blast, clearing up debris.

8th August 2020 Raising Emergency Supplies for 250 Families in Beirut Following the explosion of the Beirut harbour, a humanitarian crisis is unfolding in Lebanon. Please help us to support 250 Lebanese and Syrian families living below the poverty line who have been effected by the explosion.

24th June 2020 Common Future Invests in Alsama Studio Chinese NGO Common Future and Peaceland Foundation invest in Alsama Studio in order to develop hand-embroidered products for the Chinese market.

19th June 2020 Great! Incredible! Such a gift ! The girls are amazing! Six Alsama girls - Lujein, Aseel, Hadeel, Ghadir, Amina and Yasmin - performed Phenomenal Woman today live on zoom. 805 people watched in stunned amazement.

12th June 2020 Alsama and Peirene Press join forces for World Refugee Day Join us for a webinar where for the first time ever an international audience can hear the authors of ‘Shatila Stories’ speak about their experience living in Shatila and writing this extraordinary book.

8th June 2020 Alsama Girls Perform Phenomenal Woman by Maya Angelou 'Shatila's Phenomenal Women' - a short film made during the COVID-19 lockdown by 40 Syrian and Palestinian refugee girls and young women from the Alsama Centre in Shatila. Watched the poem performed as you've never seen it before.

28th April 2020 Cedar Cricket Club wins 1st international challenge Last week cricketers from Shatila, Bourj al Barajneh and Majdel al Anjaar camps took part in their first international sports challenge. And they have come out top, beating teams from UK and US. Huge congratulations!

28th April 2020 UK top TEFL school teaches Alsama children We are delighted to announce our collaboration with Discovery Summer, one of the top English language schools in the UK. All Alsama children are now receiving 3 hours per week of English classes.

20th April 2020 Alsama children online and receiving lessons via zoom All 210 Alsama children - in the Bekaa tents and Shatila and Bourj al-Barajneh camps - have now been connected to wifi, and are receiving cricket, yoga and creative writing lessons online.

20th April 2020 Thank you for your amazing support! You have helped us to raise more than £30,000 in support of our 133 Alsama Syrian refugee families during the COVID-19 lockdown.