History
UMMA was started by a small group of UCLA students in 1991. Their goal: to set up a free clinic for the benefit of an entire community, based on the premise that healthcare is a right and not a privilege. The student founders approached and won the support of the City of Los Angeles; University of California, Los Angeles, and Charles R. Drew University.
They worked with government officials to raise $1.3 million in grants, brainstormed with architects to rebuild a dilapidated structure on Florence Ave. in South Los Angeles, and collected donated equipment.
In September 1996, UMMA Clinic's doors to the community were opened. The students have since themselves become doctors, researchers and parents.
Over a ten-year period, UMMA's infrastructure has grown considerably; today employing 18 full-time staff, supported by a legion of volunteers.
Since UMMA's birth, over ten Muslim founded charitable health clinics have been established throughout the United States.
Read more about this topic: UMMA Community Clinic
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“No cause is left but the most ancient of all, the one, in fact, that from the beginning of our history has determined the very existence of politics, the cause of freedom versus tyranny.”
—Hannah Arendt (1906–1975)
“History is more or less bunk. It’s tradition. We don’t want tradition. We want to live in the present and the only history that is worth a tinker’s damn is the history we make today.”
—Henry Ford (1863–1947)
“The disadvantage of men not knowing the past is that they do not know the present. History is a hill or high point of vantage, from which alone men see the town in which they live or the age in which they are living.”
—Gilbert Keith Chesterton (1874–1936)