Dear Friends,
Thank you for visiting the Teach First Sri Lanka website, and for sharing our commitment to improving children’s education. We are a team of experienced educators, change-makers, policy-shapers, technologists and social entrepreneurs, who come from diverse backgrounds but share a common goal:to empower change through action.
We need your help to bring Teach First Sri Lanka’s mission to life. We invite you to reflect on the root causes that plague Sri Lanka’s education system, leaving society’s most vulnerable children without the emotional and cognitive tools needed to meet the challenges of a rapidly changing world. Our mission is to give every Sri Lankan child, regardless of their socio-economic background, a holistic education that encourages critical thinking and creativity over rote memorization.
We believe that change is possible when we work together, with a collective, long-term, and focused attempt to address the fault lines that plague our education systems. We start with the foundational belief that we are on this journey together. We know that it will take time and effort to see the fruits of our labour, but we are optimistic that it can be done because we have seen it happen in other countries across the Teach for All network, including India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh.
WE OWE IT TO THE CHILDREN TO LISTEN.
Listening is fundamental to how the Teach for All Network operates across the world. We have spent the last two years listening, researching, and studying the fault lines in Sri Lankan education to better understand the cracks through which most of our most vulnerable children fall. In Batticaloa, we have witnessed first-hand how changes in teaching approaches can have a positive impact on how children respond to teachers and materials, particularly in STEM subjects.
Our mission begins at the grassroots, in the most neglected communities, before working its way up towards systematic change at the policy level. It is a long journey, but one that we believe is necessary to address some hard truths around ethnicity, class, and caste, and to understand that neglect of one community is a neglect of all Sri Lankan society. A truly world-class, equitable, and empathetic Sri Lankan education system will offer every child the same avenues for intellectual development, regardless of their background.
We recognize that there is no single solution to bring about long overdue change to how we educate society’s most vulnerable children. Only a society working together towards the betterment and constant refinement of our education system can ensure that it meets the emotional and intellectual needs of young children of today and tomorrow. Teach First Sri Lanka’s mission, therefore, is to bring about a collective consciousness about our national education systems. It is only that collective consciousness that will drive every level of society to come together to make education work for every Sri Lankan child.
We invite you to join us in our mission to make a meaningful and sustainable impact in the lives of all children across Sri Lanka, both inside and outside the classroom. Together, we can work towards addressing the education crisis and ensure that every child has the opportunity to reach their full potential.
Yours Sincerely,
David