In 1904, Al-Azhar began extending its reach and incorporated existing institutions of education throughout the Egyptian Delta. Alexandria (1904), Tanta (1914), Damietta (1914), and Dissouq (1914) all became part of the Azhar system. The process of becoming part of the Azhar system included standardized testing and curriculum, the eventual appointment of local rectors, and mandatory residence for the young male students. Eventually, these students would travel to Cairo and attend al-Azhar's main campus and become ulema. They would receive an al-Azhar degree that brought them currency with the Cairo based ulema, but also would begin to purport an Azhari approach to Islamic law and thought. The incorporation of these institutes was meant to cleanse them of competing visions of Islam, particularly the local predominance of the Sufi Orders. The Ahmadi Institute in Tanta posed a particularly unique threat in that the Ahmadi Sufi Order was both the dominant social and religious institution. This paper will argue that at the end of the 19th century, al-Azhar crafted an "Egyptian" form of reform to cleanse the country of supra-national and international Sufi orders and that both elites and students at the Ahmadi Institute collaborated with these efforts, but strictly for economic and pragmatic reasons.