Online Students Policy

ILM Centre is the trading name of Yaseen Academy Online Ltd and operates as an online marketplace connecting students with teachers who provide Islamic education and related learning services.

The purpose of ILM Centre is to make it easier for students and families to find suitable teachers for online learning, including Qur'an, Islamic Studies, Arabic and other areas of Islamic education offered through the platform.

Because ILM Centre operates online, students and teachers may be based in different countries and may have different cultural backgrounds, educational experiences, languages and time zones. This is an important part of the way the service operates and is reflected throughout this policy.

ILM Centre wants students to have a positive learning experience in which they feel comfortable, respected and able to learn. At the same time, students are expected to recognise that online learning works best when everyone involved behaves responsibly and treats one another with courtesy.

This policy explains the standards expected of students, the role of parents and guardians where relevant, how lessons and communication should be managed, and what students can do if they experience a problem or have a concern.

This policy applies to anyone using ILM Centre as a student, whether they are booking lessons for themselves or arranging lessons for another person.

It also applies to parents, guardians or other adults who arrange or participate in lessons on behalf of a child.

The policy applies whether learning takes place through a live one-to-one lesson, a group lesson, a trial lesson or another online learning arrangement facilitated through ILM Centre.

The policy is intended to operate internationally. A teacher may, for example, be based in one country while a student is based in another. Students should therefore understand that some practical matters, such as lesson times, public holidays, internet availability and communication arrangements, may differ between the student and teacher.

ILM Centre is committed to providing a marketplace in which students can access Islamic education in a safe, respectful and professional environment.

We will seek to provide students with clear information about using the platform and, where information is available, about the teachers offering their services through ILM Centre. We will also maintain appropriate processes for dealing with concerns, complaints and safeguarding matters.

We expect teachers using ILM Centre to maintain appropriate professional standards and boundaries. Where concerns are brought to our attention, they will be considered seriously and appropriate action will be taken within ILM Centre's role and responsibilities.

ILM Centre also recognises that students are individuals. Some students may be learning for the first time, while others may have considerable previous knowledge. Some may be children, while others may be adults. Students may also have different learning needs, languages and levels of confidence.

Our aim is therefore not to impose a single way of learning on everyone, but to provide an environment in which appropriate teaching relationships can develop and students can make meaningful progress.

ILM Centre operates as an online teachers marketplace. Its role is to facilitate the connection between students and teachers and to provide the platform and associated services through which lessons can be arranged.

The teacher is responsible for delivering the lesson itself, including preparing appropriate teaching material, providing instruction and supporting the student's learning within the agreed lesson arrangement.

Students should therefore distinguish between a concern about the ILM Centre platform or service and a matter relating to the content or delivery of an individual lesson.

For example, a question about how to use the platform may be directed to ILM Centre, while a question about the material being taught may normally be addressed to the teacher.

Where a student is unable to resolve an issue directly with a teacher, or where the concern involves professional conduct, safeguarding, inappropriate communication or another serious matter, the student should contact ILM Centre.

Nothing in this policy removes a student's right to raise a concern with ILM Centre where they believe that something has gone wrong.

Students and parents are encouraged to consider their own requirements when selecting a teacher. The right teacher will depend on the student's age, subject, level of study, preferred language, availability and individual learning objectives.

Information displayed about teachers should be considered carefully before a booking is made. Where ILM Centre provides information about qualifications, experience, teaching subjects or availability, students should use this information to help them make an informed choice.

Once a teacher has been selected, the student and teacher should establish a clear understanding of the lesson arrangements. This may include the subject being taught, expected lesson duration, frequency of lessons and the time at which lessons will take place.

Students are encouraged to discuss any important learning requirements with the teacher at an early stage. This is particularly useful where a student has specific educational needs, is at an unusual level of study, or requires lessons to be delivered in a particular language.

An online lesson is still a learning environment and should be treated accordingly.

Students are expected to approach lessons with a reasonable level of preparation and respect. This means arriving on time, having the necessary equipment available and giving the lesson their attention.

A student may ask questions, request clarification or disagree respectfully with a point made during a lesson. Islamic education can involve differences of scholarly opinion and differences in teaching approaches, and these can be discussed appropriately. Personal attacks, insults or deliberately disruptive behaviour are not an appropriate way to deal with disagreement.

Students should also remember that their teacher may be teaching from a different country or cultural environment. Accents, expressions, communication styles and teaching methods may differ. Students are expected to approach these differences with patience and courtesy.

During lessons, students should avoid behaviour that unnecessarily distracts from learning. Where a parent or another adult is present, they should also allow the teacher to maintain an appropriate teaching environment.

ILM Centre is an Islamic education marketplace and expects users of the service to maintain a respectful attitude towards teachers and fellow students.

This does not mean that students are expected to agree with everything that is said or taught. Questions and respectful discussion are an important part of learning. However, disagreement should not develop into hostility, ridicule or abuse.

ILM Centre will not accept behaviour such as bullying, intimidation, threats, harassment, discriminatory abuse, sexual harassment or deliberately offensive conduct.

Students should also be mindful of appropriate behaviour and presentation during online lessons. The environment in which a student participates should, as far as reasonably possible, be suitable for learning and consistent with the nature of the lesson.

Where a student has particular circumstances that make certain expectations difficult to meet, they should discuss this with ILM Centre or the teacher rather than simply disengaging from lessons.

ILM Centre may facilitate lessons for children and young people. The safety and welfare of children is therefore an important consideration in the operation of the platform.

Parents and guardians remain responsible for making appropriate decisions about their child's participation in online learning and should take reasonable steps to understand how their child's lessons will operate.

Parents and guardians are encouraged to remain appropriately involved in their child's online learning, particularly for younger children. The appropriate level of parental involvement will depend on the child's age, maturity, circumstances and the nature of the lesson.

Teachers are expected to maintain professional boundaries when teaching children. Students who are children should never be encouraged to keep inappropriate communications secret from their parents or guardians.

If a child or parent has a concern about a teacher's behaviour, communication or conduct, this should be reported to ILM Centre promptly.

ILM Centre will consider safeguarding concerns seriously and will take appropriate action within its role, which may include restricting access to the platform, investigating the concern or referring a matter to an appropriate authority where required.

Safeguarding is everyone's responsibility.

A safeguarding concern may arise where a student believes that a child, young person or vulnerable person may be experiencing abuse, neglect, exploitation, grooming, inappropriate sexual behaviour, coercion, intimidation or another serious risk to their welfare.

Students should not attempt to investigate a safeguarding concern themselves. If something makes a student uncomfortable or causes them to believe that someone may be at risk, they should report the concern to ILM Centre using the designated contact details.

Where appropriate, ILM Centre may need to share information with relevant individuals, organisations or authorities in order to protect a person from harm. The approach taken will depend on the circumstances and any applicable legal or regulatory requirements.

As ILM Centre operates internationally, safeguarding situations may involve people in different countries. This may affect which local authority, emergency service or other organisation is relevant.

Where there is an immediate risk of serious harm, the student or parent/guardian should contact the appropriate emergency service in the country where the emergency is taking place. ILM Centre should also be informed where appropriate.

Communication between students and teachers should remain connected to the learning relationship and should be conducted respectfully.

ILM Centre encourages students and teachers to use the communication facilities provided or approved by the platform wherever possible. This provides greater clarity about the learning relationship and can help ensure that concerns can be addressed if something goes wrong.

There may be circumstances in which a student and teacher communicate through another method. Where this happens, appropriate professional boundaries should still be maintained.

Students should not feel pressured to provide personal telephone numbers, private social media accounts, photographs or other personal information to a teacher.

A teacher should not pressure a student to move conversations into a private or secret communication channel, particularly where the student is a child.

Any student who feels uncomfortable about a teacher's communications should raise the matter with ILM Centre.

Students should take reasonable precautions when participating in online lessons.

Accounts should be protected with secure passwords, and students should not give their login details to other people. If a student believes that their account has been accessed by somebody else, they should notify ILM Centre as soon as possible.

Students should also be careful about the information they share online. There is normally no need to provide a teacher with sensitive personal information that is unrelated to the lesson.

Students should not share another student's or teacher's personal information without permission. This includes telephone numbers, private email addresses, photographs, private messages and other information that was not intended for public distribution.

ILM Centre will handle personal information in accordance with its applicable privacy and data protection arrangements.

Online lessons may contain personal information, teaching material and private conversations. For this reason, students must not record or distribute lessons without appropriate permission.

This includes video recordings, audio recordings, screen recordings, photographs and screenshots.

Permission to record a lesson should not be assumed simply because the lesson is taking place online.

Where a recording is permitted for a legitimate educational purpose, it should be used only for the agreed purpose and should not be uploaded to social media, shared publicly or distributed to other people without the necessary permission.

Parents and guardians should follow the same requirements when observing or participating in a child's lesson.

Students are responsible for attending lessons at the agreed time and should make reasonable efforts to be ready when the lesson begins.

Because ILM Centre operates internationally, particular care should be taken when agreeing lesson times. Students and teachers may be in different time zones, and changes caused by daylight saving arrangements or local circumstances can occasionally create confusion.

The student and teacher should ensure that the agreed lesson time is clear. Where the platform displays the time automatically, students should still check that it reflects their local time correctly.

If a student cannot attend a lesson, they should provide as much notice as reasonably possible. Cancellation, rescheduling and refund arrangements will depend on the applicable terms of the booking and any arrangements agreed with the teacher or ILM Centre.

Where a student repeatedly misses lessons without reasonable explanation, ILM Centre may contact the student or parent/guardian where appropriate to establish whether there is a problem and whether the learning arrangement remains suitable.

Students should follow the payment arrangements provided by ILM Centre.

Where payments are required to be made through the ILM Centre platform, students should not feel pressured by a teacher to bypass those arrangements.

Students should be cautious if a teacher asks them to make payments through an unexpected personal account or payment method. Any request that appears unusual or inconsistent with ILM Centre's arrangements should be reported to ILM Centre before payment is made.

The terms applying to fees, cancellations, refunds and other financial matters will be set out separately in ILM Centre's applicable terms and conditions.

Feedback from students is important to ILM Centre. Students may be invited to provide feedback about their experience or to review a teacher.

Feedback should be genuine and based on the student's actual experience. Students should not use reviews to threaten, intimidate or pressure a teacher into providing a refund or other benefit.

Where a student is unhappy with a lesson or teacher, they are encouraged to raise the matter through the appropriate ILM Centre process rather than using public criticism as a substitute for making a complaint.

A complaint may relate to the quality of a service, a teacher's conduct, communication, safeguarding, payment arrangements or another matter connected with ILM Centre.

Students should provide sufficient information for the concern to be understood. This may include the teacher's name, the relevant lesson date, a description of what happened and any relevant messages or other evidence.

Complaints will be considered fairly and proportionately. Where a complaint involves a safeguarding or serious conduct concern, it may be dealt with under a separate safeguarding or complaints procedure.

ILM Centre wants to resolve problems constructively wherever possible. However, there are circumstances in which action may be necessary to protect students, teachers or the integrity of the platform.

Examples of conduct that may result in action include:

• Serious or repeated bullying or harassment.
• Threatening or abusive behaviour.
• Discriminatory or hateful conduct.
• Sexual harassment or inappropriate sexual communication.
• Attempts to exploit or manipulate another user.
• Fraudulent activity or impersonation.
• Deliberate misuse of another person's account.
• Unauthorised recording or distribution of private lessons.
• Attempts to circumvent the platform's payment arrangements.
• Deliberate disruption of lessons.
• Conduct creating a safeguarding or serious safety concern.
• Any other serious breach of ILM Centre's terms or policies.

Depending on the circumstances, ILM Centre may issue a warning, restrict particular services, suspend an account or terminate access to the platform.

In serious safeguarding or safety situations, immediate action may be necessary without waiting for a matter to progress through a normal warning process.

ILM Centre welcomes students and teachers from different parts of the world.

An international learning environment brings together people who may differ in language, nationality, culture, educational background and communication style. These differences should be treated as part of the learning environment rather than as a reason for disrespect.

Students should not be mocked or treated unfairly because of their accent, language ability, nationality or cultural background.

Equally, students should be able to raise legitimate concerns about teaching or conduct without those concerns being dismissed simply because the teacher or student comes from a different cultural background.

ILM Centre aims to provide an environment in which people can participate respectfully while maintaining appropriate standards of conduct.

Students may have different learning requirements or circumstances that affect how they participate in online lessons.

Students or parents/guardians should tell ILM Centre or the teacher about relevant requirements as early as possible. This gives the organisation and teacher an opportunity to consider whether reasonable adjustments or alternative arrangements can be made.

Depending on the circumstances, this might involve changes to lesson arrangements, communication methods, learning materials, lesson pacing or other reasonable measures.

Not every adjustment will be possible in every situation, particularly where the service is provided by an individual teacher through an online marketplace. However, requests will be considered appropriately and students should be encouraged to discuss their requirements rather than withdrawing from learning because of an avoidable difficulty.

Online education depends on internet connections, devices and third-party technology. Technical problems can therefore occur even when a student and teacher have made reasonable preparations.

Students should notify the teacher or ILM Centre promptly when a technical problem prevents or significantly disrupts a lesson.

Where appropriate, the circumstances can then be considered when deciding whether a lesson should be rearranged or whether another solution is appropriate.

Students are expected to take reasonable steps to ensure that their own equipment and internet connection are suitable for online learning, but genuine technical problems will not automatically be treated as misconduct.

ILM Centre wants students to feel comfortable raising concerns.

A student does not need to wait until a problem becomes serious before seeking help. If something about a lesson, teacher, communication or platform is making them uncomfortable, they should raise it as soon as reasonably possible.

Concerns can include:

• A safeguarding or welfare concern.
• Inappropriate communication from a teacher.
• Bullying or harassment.
• Concerns about a teacher's professional boundaries.
• Problems with payments or bookings.
• Repeated technical or platform problems.
• Concerns about privacy.
• A complaint about the service provided.

General enquiries, student support, safeguarding and complaints should be sent to info@ilmcentre.com.

Where the concern relates to an immediate danger or emergency, students should contact the appropriate emergency service in their country rather than relying on ILM Centre as an emergency response service.

Students are expected to familiarise themselves with this policy before using ILM Centre and to comply with the standards it sets out.

Parents and guardians arranging lessons for children should also read the policy and ensure that they understand the arrangements applying to their child's use of the platform.

Teachers have separate responsibilities under ILM Centre's teacher terms, code of conduct and safeguarding requirements. This student policy does not replace those obligations.

Where a situation is not specifically addressed in this policy, ILM Centre will consider the circumstances reasonably and may refer to its other policies, terms and procedures.

ILM Centre will review this policy periodically and may update it where necessary.

A review may be undertaken following changes to the services provided by ILM Centre, changes in relevant legal or safeguarding requirements, technological developments, feedback from students or teachers, or lessons learned from complaints and incidents.

The most recent version of the policy should be made available to students through the appropriate ILM Centre communication or online platform.