Education Sri Lanka Project #47845

Tea Leaf Vision Professional Development Centres

by Tea Leaf Trust

Project Report | Jun 6, 2021
The third wave hits

By Tim Pare | Co-Founder

Brighter days ahead, a walk by 1 of our centres

Dear All,

I hope that you and your families are all safe and well.

I am afraid this report brings more of the same to your inboxes, although if anything, the situation is getting worse.

The impact of previous lockdowns on the tea estate communities has been largely economic with people unable to work outside of the estates and even poorly paid tea picking work hard to come by. This has led to widespread and intensified poverty. However, despite all the warnings, the government and local council of Nuwara Eliya gave the go ahead for an annual festival called 'April Season'. Here, some of the more affluent communities from around the country escape the intense heat of the island to attend events throughout the month up in the mountains. Of course, this became a super spreader event and it is the communities of Nuwara Eliya and surrounding areas - almost entirely tea estates - who have suffered.

Tea Leaf Trust recently supported the local government to set-up a second quarantine facility, and people have once again not been able to leave their homes and communities. This has placed intense pressure on families of 6 to 8 people sharing line rooms, which are commonly one room with a lean-too kitchen.

Understandably within this environment, our centres have once again closed until further notice and our focus is on emotional support of our staff and students in order to ensure they know they are not alone and we are here even when our schools are closed.

Thank you for all of your amazing support. We could not do this without you.

Tim, Yas and all at Tea Leaf Trust.

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Feb 16, 2021
As we begin 2021

By Tim Pare | Co-Founder

Hello Everyone,

Firstly, we hope that you and your loved ones continue to be safe and well - wherever in the world you are.

Sri Lanka was shut down for large portions of 2020 and, despite the incredible commitment of our staff, centres were only able to open for a total of four months during the year. This was not enough for us to feel we had served our cohorts of students properly and so they have all been offered another place for 2021 - all our programmes are free to these communities. If they are not able to attend, they have certainly gained confidence and a basic level of English and some employability skills. Out employment team is supporting those in desperate need of work to find employment.

For those returning students, and new students, classes started at the beginning of February and we were oversubscribed for all of our three centres. Due to Covid-19 protocols, the cohorts have been split and class days are on rotation. This will inevitably lead to some tough designs about content, but we are just thrilled to be back and busy helping those we support.

We lost a key funder due to the pandemic, after 5 years of support LBR Foundation has taken a year out of all of their funding - we hope to work with them again in 2022. This leaves us with a huge hole to fill and we are so grateful for your support that helps hugely with this.

Finally, we have moved to a new, more sustainable model. This gives greater opportunities for the young graduates of Tea Leaf Vision Centres to become trainee teachers and they are mentored and their skills developed by our senior teachers who focus on sharing their knowledge and providing oversight. The model has been tested thoroughly at the end of 2019 and across the four months of 2020 and we have seen wonderful results both for the students and the trainees. Not only does the change mean more graduates wishing to teach get a teaching qualification through The British Council (TKT Module One), but it also gives us a growing number of suitable and committed teachers to enable further expansion in 2022.

Thank you again for your amazing support, we truly appreciate it and value it even more when it comes during such trying times.

With best wishes,

Tim and Yas - and all at Tea Leaf Trust

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Oct 26, 2020
Our Centres and Curfew

By Tim Pare | Co-Founder

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