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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