The Tea Leaf Trust opened the doors to its full-time Centre for Professional Development in January 2010. Currently (2011) we teach 123 students  (110 on the main diploma and 13 on the intern programme) the skills needed to gain employment away from the back-breaking generational tea plucking and cultivation that many of the youth in the Maskeliya region will no doubt enter into without some form further education. 

As our centre offers its one-year Professional Development course free of charge, it means that the poorest now have access to courses such as professional English, I.T. and Business, which they would not be able to afford otherwise. 

We also bring basic English to over 700 7-12 year olds on the tea plantations in and around Maskeliya. Many of these Estates are difficult to get to, because of the rough terrain and so we will go to the local communities to teach, giving these youngsters a good grounding in the English Language. 

We are asking people for a monthly donation of £15. It costs the Tea Leaf Trust £15 a month to have one student at the centre. These costs include water, electricity, stationary, rent, educational resources and teaching. This money also covers the resources for teaching and monitoring 10 children on the Community English Outreach Programme (each student teaches approximately 10 children - see our projects section for more information). Your £15 will enable us to continue to bring vital skills to both the youth and children in and around Maskeliya, which is fast becoming a vital provision for this mainly manual-labour community.

Our Tea Leaf Vision Centre for Professional Development is providing the hard skills needed to gain better-paid employment in offices and businesses. It also allows the students of different ethnicities a chance to understand one other, mix and makes friends. Its provides our students with hope that they can break the cycle of poverty and help their families rise out of the harsh conditions that they live in.

Furthermore, our Success and Ethics course has been integrated into the teaching timetable to tackle the tricky issues of gender inequality, gender-based violence and alcohol abuse, things that are extremely common and need to be addressed in this part of the country for an improved quality of life.

Sponsor a student for £20 a month 

80% of our students come from the surrounding Tea Estates and farmlands, some walking up to 20km, so that they can attend our free one-year diploma course at our Centre for Professional Development. Often it is because they are too poor to afford the bus fare, and many make this journey in flip flops, so as to save their shoes which, being very cheap, would be unable to withstand the distances travelled per week.

Many of those who study with us face opposition from their parents, because attending our classes means the loss of a wage, even though in the long run the parents acknowledge that it will improve their children's chances of getting well-paid sustainable employment.

Our website brings you case studies of students attending the school, so that you can see how access to further education is changing lives, and that even a little bit of support means so much and goes such a long way in Sri Lanka (see links below).

Sponsoring our poorest students for less than £1 a day (approximately £20 a month) will pay for the costs mentioned above and additionally will provide money for the bus to school, exercise books and an extra pair of shoes. It will also ease their families' financial burden, helping gain the support of their parents.

 Case studies:

• Chandrika's Story
• Ram's Story
• Maya's Story
• Gayen's Story
  

These are just a few examples of our students. We hope to bring you more throughout the year.

To make a regular donation to either the centre or a student, click below:

Regular sponsorship