Page 83 - Annual Report_2

The first step in our educational journey begins in school. So, the school plays a major role in

developing an individual in every aspect. Some schools in Sri Lanka have less facilities. So helping

schools with less facilities is a great service to the children who are educated there. Therefore, the

project “Piyapath” was launched with the primary objective of helping such underprivileged schools.

Project Together SL - Piyapath by the eleven Rotaract clubs in the Zone 2 was a Community service

initiative lined up after a thorough research of an underprivileged community in the Katugasthota

region. The motive of the initiative was to reach the community development aspect through

strengthening the education, literacy and abilities of the students. Rotaract Club of Athugalpura,

Hatton – Kotagala, Kandy, Katugastota Region, Kurunegala, Matale, Neptune Edification, Peace City

Hatton, University of Peradeniya and Uva Wellassa University – Badulla participated for this

humanitarian project. Our mission in this was “To be the wing which helps them to fly towards their

dreams”.

Sri Sumanathissa Vidyalaya situated in Yatihalagala, a school with less facilities, was selected for this

purpose. As a responsible group of young adults, we thought of getting together and to make their

lives better with whatever small changes we can do. The Prime Beneficiaries of this project was the

students of CP/KT/ Sri Sumanathissa Junior School – Yatihalagala. Here we focused on developing a

better environment where students can actively engage in their daily learning activities. Also, the

students are given the opportunity to develop their different skills and given the motivation to make

this a chance to make their lives better in future. Also, the other set of beneficiaries in this project

was the teachers of the school where they were serving the students with very minimal facilities. We

expected to create a learning friendly environment (Physical and Mental) where they can carry out

their daily lessons effectively with the students.

The main objectives of this project were, Improvement of education and literacy of students,

Renovation of the Infrastructure of the school to accommodate quality education, Improvement of

the sanitary facilities, Health and Well-being of the school system, and Replantation in the areas

where deforestation has been carried out due to developmental projects.

The main challenge that we faced was the current Covid-19 pandemic situation which is the health

crisis that the whole world is grappling with the well-being and livelihoods of their communities.

Thus, implementing a project during this time certainly made us to face a performance bar, as we

had to mainly consider the protection of people. We had to continually assess the risks and adjust

operations in order to increase the performance of the project execution as the pandemic easily

prone us to weaken links due to lack of physical meetings. Nevertheless, from the commencement of

the project, the social media provided us the platform for us to discuss about the project, rather than

holding physical meetings which was a risk during that time, as the members of the clubs are from

different areas. After overcoming all obstacles, we were finally able to complete this project very

successfully.

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