Salam School expansion promises big benefits for Greater Milwaukee Muslim community

Photos by Mouna Photography

Students left Salam Middle and High School, 4707 S. 13 St., at the end of yesterday’s school day. An expansion project will create a separate campus for the high school for the 2025-26 school year and beyond.

The Islamic Society of Milwaukee is launching a $15 million project in Franklin to expand and improve Salam School of Milwaukee, and provide opportunities for the Greater Milwaukee Muslim community.

ISM begins construction this month at a 13-acre property at 8910 S. 102nd St., Franklin, ISM president Salah Sarsour told the Wisconsin Muslim Journal today. Salam High School is expected to start the 2025-26 school year in its new location, he added.

Salam School currently has two facilities: Salam Elementary School at 815 W. Layton Ave., Milwaukee, and Salam Middle-High School at 4707 S. 13 St, Milwaukee. With the expansion, the high school will move to its own campus.

ISM purchased the former Showtime Cinema property in early April for $3.2 million, closing just before Eid. The cinema closed in September 2023, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported in a news story about ISM’s purchase.

Islamic Society of Milwaukee purchased the 13.2-acre site of a former Showtime Cinema in April.

New developments to the property will also serve the Franklin community, ISM executive director Othman Atta told a reporter. “We are doing all we can to lift the community because we are a part of this community,” Atta said in an April 15 TMJ4 broadcast.

ISM has been looking for additional space on the south side of Milwaukee for multiple programs, Atta told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. After many years of not finding a property there, ISM decided to look at properties in Franklin, where there is a large Muslim community.

Salam Elementary School, 815 W. Layton Ave., Milwaukee, is expected to add at least one class of students per grade when the sixth grade is moved to Salam Middle School for the 2025-26 school year.

Salam School of Milwaukee Head of School Wanis H. Shalaby sat down with the Wisconsin Muslim Journal recently to discuss Salam School’s expansion and how it will benefit the school and community.

Read the highlights of the interview, paraphrased below.

An important milestone and sign of a bright future

The planned expansion of Salam School of Milwaukee is a sign of both the growth of the Greater Milwaukee Muslim community and the strong reputation of Salam School as an excellent educational institution, noted Salam School of Milwaukee Head of School Wanis H. Shalaby. The expansion will offer new avenues to continue to improve the school’s quality and better serve the community, he said in a recent interview with WMJ.

The Islamic Society of Milwaukee built a large prayer facility, opened in October 1995, in a facility that housed Salam School since 1992. That same year, ISM embarked on a major renovation of the original school building purchased in 1982. 

I’ve heard Salam School has a long waitlist. How long and why?

We have a long waitlist; we have always had a long waitlist. Usually, there are about 400 on the list.

Many people are trying to get into the school because it has an established reputation for academic excellence. We are a college-bound school that has always had a 100% graduation rate. Our students always go to college very well-equipped to succeed. People hear the success stories. 

The media also resounds with success stories from our extracurricular and sports programs. 

How many students does Salam School have now in K-12?

We have 1,100 students. This year’s graduating class will have 42 students. Salam School has grown a lot since its founding in 1992.

How long have you been its head of school?

17 years

Will the expansion eliminate your waitlist?

We expect it will dramatically reduce it. But the waitlist and our burgeoning numbers are not the only reasons that propelled us to separate the high school from the middle school. We also believe the quality of education will be better served when the high school has its own campus.

What are the educational benefits of adding the new campus?

One of the main benefits is that we will be able to offer a course-fragmented program, something we don’t have room for now. That means we will be able to sequence courses based on the ability of the students, not the availability of space. It will offer our students a better set of opportunities.

For example, an 11th grader is likely to take pre-calculus and a 12th grader calculus because that is the way we sequence the courses based on room availability. With more space and a course-fragmented approach, a 9th grader who is talented in math can attend a calculus class with 12th graders. 

A second thing is we will be able to develop spaces for instructional purposes. In our current situation, every room in our middle school/high school building is used for instructional purposes, regardless of whether the room is suited to be a classroom or not. 

Third, we will be able to build an athletic complex where spaces like our basketball court will meet the regulations for a high school basketball court. That will allow us to host tournaments without having to rent a place, not to mention giving student athletes the opportunity to practice in courts of the correct size.

How will the former cinema be transformed into a high school?

I actually have the layouts in front of me on the table here. The cinema is already a very sizable facility but we will also have add-ons beyond the current building. For example, there are plans to put the gym outside the main building and have it connected to the facility.

We’re planning it to accommodate multiple users and to serve different needs the community has. Say, for instance, we have a community event taking place in the gym. We plan to create it so that it won’t disturb the instructional process at school.

The community’s needs and instructional needs will inform the design. We’ll be able to provide the high-quality education we want for our students and, at the same time, make it easier for our community to schedule events in different areas without having to be restricted to hours outside of the school’s use of the facility.

The 13-acre property in Franklin, the future campus of Salam High School, includes the former Showtime Cinema building, large parking lot and grasslands.

How will the former cinema be transformed into a high school?

I actually have the layouts in front of me on the table here. The cinema is already a very sizable facility but we will also have add-ons beyond the current building. For example, there are plans to put the gym outside the main building and connect it to the facility.

We’re planning it to accommodate multiple users and serve the different needs of the community. Say, for instance, we have a community event taking place in the gym. We plan to create it so that it won’t disturb the instructional process at school.

The community’s needs and instructional needs will inform the design. We’ll be able to provide the high-quality education we want for our students and, at the same time, make it easier for our community to schedule events in different areas without being restricted to hours outside of the school’s use of the facility.

Other major changes

We wanted to build a new campus near the existing ones but it just couldn’t happen. Franklin is about 10-12 minutes away. With the new location, we have moved into a “school district frame of thinking.” By that I mean we think about how to address things like how to stagger the morning school schedules for parents to drop several children to different locations. Likewise, we will need staggered pickup times at the end of the day to be convenient for parents.

We successfully coordinated our drop-offs and pickups between the elementary school and the middle/high school. We will follow the same line of thinking as we move from two to three locations.

Is there anything you’d like to add?

Yes. This project is a response from ISM to the pressing needs the community has to continue to improve the quality of education for our children and, at the same time, provide more opportunities for our families and the community to use our school facilities.