Introducing Tilli to our schools in Batti - West

It's been two weeks since we came back from Batti and we have so much to tell you about our experience with Tilli...

First of all for those of you that don’t know about TIlli. Tilli is a social-emotional learning tool for early learners that combines Playful Learning, Behavioral Sciences, and Data to drive lifelong, behavioral changes in kids and their caregivers. Tilli's mission is to ensure that by the time a child is 10 years old, they have all the skills, coping strategies, and mindsets they need to thrive in life.

Tilli is fun! Tiili uses gamified strategies and stories to help children build foundational social–emotional learning skills, self-awareness, and relationship skills.  We partnered up with Tilli to bring their expertise and passion regarding socio-emotional learning to our partner schools in Batticaloa. 

Why Socio-Emotional Learning

Socio-emotional learning is so important because having people who have had early childhood trauma creates a generation of adults who are withdrawn, depressed, sad and unable to reach their full potential. Socio-emotional learning encompasses essential life skills, including self-awareness, empathy, communication, and resilience. By integrating socio-emotional learning into traditional education, TFSL aims to equip students with the tools they need to succeed both academically and in life. 

This is extremely important to the schools in Batticaloa because we have approximately 300 children dropping out of school each year in the Batticaloa West Zone which consists of only 68 schools with a population of 14,600 children. Most of the children coming to these schools come from families that have gone through severe trauma due to the war and continue to have socio-economic challenges. Based on a survey that had been conducted by the Zonal Education office the children drop out of school due to a variety of reasons and some of the reasons that come on top are that they can't keep up with school, they need to drop out of school to support the family, learning disabilities and psychological issues are also on the list.

To name a few more issues that highlight the need for socio-emotional support for children in the area, there are incidents of suicide among school-going children, Child Marriage are custom and is prevalent in the area and there is the occasional brawl in the schools. When speaking to the Zonal Director (at the time) about my plan to bring the Tilli team with me to Batti, she told me about a big brawl in the O Level exam halls. So this is a crucial area that will make a difference for children in Batti West to be able to cope with the challenges that they will face throughout life.

What Happened at the Workshops

We organised to work with three schools that have primary education in Eravupattu. They were Pankudaveli, Illupadichennai and Kayankudah (The short names for the schools). These three schools are 3 of the 5 schools that TFSL hope to place fellows (as teachers) in the near future. 

We worked with over 250 primary school children (Grades 1 to 5) and 20 primary teachers from the three schools. We also had the team from Child Action Lanka join us at Illupadichennai to also get acquainted with the Tilli Toolkit to use at the CAL centre.

The workshops were absolutely fun and if you follow Tilli and TFSL on Instagram, you will be able to see some of the pictures and videos of these workshops. We had Sinan, Siva and Rajeeka as our lead trainers and they did a brilliant job. They first taught the children in their classes and the Tilli characters by reading the Tilli storybook and through fun interactive activities centred around recognizing and managing emotions. The teachers observed our work with the children and then met us after to be taken through a specially curated workshop which helped them understand the importance of SEL and how to use the Tilli kit. The Tilli team's diverse expertise, including psychologists and Special Needs education experts, contributed to the success of these workshops.

Tilli , TFSL and Child Action Lanka Teams with the Teachers of Illupadichennai Ambal Vidyalayam

A workshop with the children from Pankudaveli R.T.M.S

A workshop with the teachers from Pankudaveli R.T.M.S

Looking Ahead:

Our commitment to Socio-Emotional education transformation doesn't end with these workshops. With a WhatsApp group established for ongoing communication, with the teachers we will encourage the teachers to utilize Tilli kits for socio-emotional learning activities. We are also scheduling a plan to engage with the teachers regularly through online calls. This sustained effort will allow us to gauge the impact and refine our approach to working with the teachers. As progress continues, TFSL & Tilli plans to revisit the schools, to further enhance socio-emotional learning through Tilli's four modules: Understanding Emotions, Labelling Feelings, Managing Feelings, and Bodies and Boundaries.

Teach First Sri Lanka's collaboration with schools in the Batticaloa West Education Zone stands as a testament to the organization's dedication to reshaping education. By introducing innovative teaching methods and prioritizing socio-emotional learning, TFSL is planting the seeds for a brighter future for students in the region. Once TFSL introduces fellows to the mix we are confident that they would amplify the impact that we have initiated with our partners. As TFSL's fellows will continue to integrate these transformative methodologies, the impact is poised to be far-reaching, empowering generations of students with the skills they need to thrive in the complex modern world.

Empowering Education For A Brighter Future Through A Movement Of Leaders

The Current Reality

The current reality of Education in Sri Lanka is one that has consistently been highlighted in the news as one that is bleak for years. The key issues are that we have not changed how we educate children and our education system has an over-dependence on exams as a metric of success. Schools do not groom children to acquire skills that contemporary businesses and organizations need. Even more so is the ever-widening gap of educational inequity that we see where there is a huge lack of good teachers in rural schools and many children dropping out of school 

On the other hand, we have on average approximately 32,000 university graduates from 15 state universities. We have over 100,000 unemployed graduates, which contributes to a growing unemployment rate (over 5.5%). Teaching has been and is still a profession that a majority of women choose. Yet,  60 to 68% of our university graduates are women and we have only a 37% labour force participation of women. The question is why aren’t we able to get our own young people to fill the gap of teacher shortages in our public schools?

We constantly talk about the urgent need to groom local talent to support our economic growth. But we rarely have the flexibility in our public systems to introduce impactful change. Therefore, as a nation, we need to ask ourselves if we should continue to wait for change, or actively contribute to the change we want to see. Because the survival of our country's economy is dependent on having a strong, productive and happy workforce.

Our Mission

At Teach First Sri Lanka believe that we cannot wait for change. We just have to find a way to actively contribute to achieving change. We cannot do it alone, so we will create a movement of young leaders that will collectively lobby with communities, organisations, and people to transform and improve our education system through Collective Leadership. 

At Teach First Sri Lanka, we look forward to implementing a fellowship model where we recruit diverse young graduates with the potential to lead, from a range of experiences and academic disciplines. We will train them for a period of 6 weeks before they start teaching and then place them in underprivileged schools (that very often have a deficit of good teachers) to help children obtain an education that they otherwise may not have had.

We do not stop there…  We coach our fellows over a two-year period to ensure they meet their objectives as effective teachers and create social impact that improves the life outcomes of the children, they work with. A key part of our objective is to build an Alumni Network committed to transforming and improving the education system in Sri Lanka in the long run while drawing from their experience in the schools they served during the fellowship. They exercise Collective Leadership within our network to create systemic change and solutions to problems that are deeply entrenched in our education system.

We believe in this model because it has worked globally in more than 60 countries including Nepal, India, Bangladesh and Pakistan. Across the network of fellowships, there are more than 88,000 alumni with 15,000 teachers all a part of the Teach For All Network, which we hope to be a part of in the future. Sri Lanka is not so different, if it has worked and created an impact in 60 other countries and has helped reduce educational inequity through leadership, we have the potential to create the same reality here in our own country.

Our Fellowship Program

We want our fellows to be agents of change where they are not only effective teachers but also demonstrate leadership that will support the school culture and execute solutions that ensure that our children's ecosystem is improved so that they have a better chance at succeeding. Therefore our fellowship is founded on three key pillars to ensure that this is achieved.

1. Effective Teaching

2. Personal Leadership Development

3. Movement & Mission

You can find out what this really means by reading our Teach First Sri Lanka Report 2023.

Our Fellowship Program focuses on introducing change in how teachers teach children. We believe in the need for holistic education that holds Socio-emotional learning, critical thinking, literacy & numeracy and encourages children to have a growth mindset at its core. We believe that our fellows would find ways to ensure that they are empathetic to the student’s needs and that they learn in an environment focused on their needs using the skills that we teach them. We will ensure that our schools are in good hands.

Where do we start?

We are working with Child Action Lanka (CAL) to conduct a 1-year pilot fellowship program and we have chosen to start in 5 schools from the Eravupaththu division in the Batticaloa West Education Zone. We will place 3 fellows in each school to fill the deficit of teachers in Science, Math, English and IT in middle school (Grades 6 to 9). Once we have completed the 1-year pilot program, we are committed to following in the footsteps of the Teach For All network and forming a fellowship that is in line with their unifying principals.

We have chosen Batticaloa because we have spent a lot of time evaluating the situation and conducted a Situational Analysis that compared two rural locations in Sri Lanka. Batticaloa is a district with many rural communities and is a district with one of the highest dropout rates in the country. They also face consistent teacher shortages. (Please Read this article which gives a clear explanation of the context in rural Batticaloa communities: Link)

While this was important for our decision, Batticaloa is the place to start because more than all else, there is hope in Batticaloa! 

The Batticaloa West Zonal Education Team is a proactive group of individuals that genuinely care about doing all they can to get things done and support their schools to do better. Furthermore, they made us believe that change is possible through their leadership. Again, there is a vibrant network of support that can be activated to create change in these schools that springs from the young people that are passionate about social justice, universities, and other organizations that are keen on supporting children in rural schools if they are given the chance. We have a network of supporters that are helping us achieve the mission we are setting out to achieve. Have a look at our Network of Support.

Child Action Lanka has a Centre in close proximity to the schools that we have chosen to work with, and we will be collaborating to work together to offer the support that our fellows will need to be effective in their fellowship.

This picture was taken at the Batticaloa West Zonal Education Office.

From left to right: Mr Kugathasan (Deputy Director of Education), Jeremy De Zilwa (CEO - TFSL), Lilani Munasinghe (Founding Director- TFSL), Ms Ahila Canagasooriyam (Zonal Director of Education), Charith Abeyratne (Director- TFSL), David Boehm (Founding Director & Board Chair- TFSL).

Discover Teach First Sri Lanka

We are excited to announce the launch of our new website, www.teachfirst.lk, which serves as a hub of information, resources, and opportunities to join us in our mission of creating a more inclusive and equitable education system in Sri Lanka. Our website is designed to provide you with a comprehensive understanding of Teach First Sri Lanka's vision, initiatives, and impact. As you navigate through the site, you'll find detailed information about our mission, core values, and the fellowship program that we offer to improve educational outcomes for students across Sri Lanka.

We are a not-for-profit organization, but we are not a charity! We are giving communities the fishing rod and not the fish! We empower young people to become leaders and create sustainable change. They will offer our children an opportunity they otherwise would not have had. A chance in life, a chance to understand the value of a good education, a chance to put in the hard work and succeed. 

Join the Community of Support

We invite you to join our Google Community of Support, an online platform where educators, volunteers, and supporters come together to exchange ideas, share experiences, and collaborate on projects. By joining this community, you'll have the opportunity to stay informed about what we are doing and connect with like-minded individuals who are passionate about education and are actively working towards its transformation in Sri Lanka. To join, simply visit https://groups.google.com/g/community-of-support and become a part of this dynamic network. We want you to join our mission to transform education in Sri Lanka.

We will be having regular discussions, where we give you the opportunity to speak one on one with our stakeholders of change-makers and be a part of the discussion on changing education in Sri Lanka.

On the 19th of June 2023, we will be conducting a Community Discussion. On this Zoom Call, you will get to meet different stakeholders that support TFSL.

So please join us and stay informed!

Get Involved

Teach First Sri Lanka welcomes individuals passionate about education and eager to make a positive impact. Whether you are an educator, a student, a parent, or a concerned citizen, there are various ways to get involved. From volunteering opportunities to mentorship programs, you can contribute your time, skills, and expertise to empower education and support the growth of students and teachers alike. Please reach out to us if you would like to be a part of our cause.

We could not have come this far without them

Building an organization and finding our identity has been a challenging one. We haven’t been able to do it alone. I thank David and Lily our founding directors for standing in our corner and doing whatever it took to get to this stage. I will need to write another blog article to explain how they have gone above and beyond. Also thank you to the rest of the board.

Furthermore, without Deb and Dilshan from CAL having introduced us to Batticaloa and allowing me to work and stay at the Centre we probably would not have found ourselves here today. Also a huge thank you to the ever-hospitable team at the Batticaloa CAL Centre.

We also thank Charith, who is a Teach First Alum and he truly believes in our vision and has taken the time to regularly contribute to key parts of our development. We also thank Sherangi for helping us find our brand identity and effectively communicate who we are! You have been extremely patient and passionate which I appreciate and respect.

More than all else, there are so many people to thank from Batticaloa that have helped me. We have been tremendously fortunate enough to find people with the right energy and appetite for change.

As a core value, we must collectively work with communities, organizations, and people to achieve systemic change. We are constantly looking for people to work with and join us on our journey!

Sincerely, Jeremy De Zilwa

School visits in Wilgamuwa

On the 26th of October 2022, David, Lily and I were fortunate enough to find the time to revisit Wilgamuwa Zone in the Matale district and visit some of the schools that belonged to the zone. It had been a little more than a month since I had last visited Wilgamuwa for a workshop with a diverse group of stakeholders that belonged to the Wilgamuwa Education Zone. We needed to return and build relationships with schools and further evaluate their circumstance. 

Wilgamuwa is about 110 km from Kandy and the most central town is Hettipola, which is where the Zonal Office is. There are two routes to Wilgamuwa, the first is above the knuckles mountain range through Matale and Naula, and the second is below the mountain range through the famous 18 bend road of Sri Lanka. Which is the route that we took this time.  By the time we reached Wilgamuwa, it was night and we would need to start early to cover the three schools that we planned to visit.

Madakanda Kanishta Vidyalaya

The first school on our list was Madakanda K.V. I met the principal and the English teacher the last time we visited Wilgamuwa at the aforementioned workshop and it was good to see them again. We visited at a good time because we had the school's 15th Anniversary was coming up and the principal, teachers, students and parents had organised a market on that day. The children had brought a variety of fruits, vegetables and handicrafts which they sold to the villagers and parents in the area. Very enterprising!

We sat down to speak to the principal for a chat about the school. He has been a teacher in the school since 2013 and was now the acting principal for the last two years. He spoke to us mainly about the teacher shortage issue and how it is a struggle to make sure all subjects are taught. The School taught up until O-Levels, after which children would shift to a more central school. The school has about 250 children with 16 teachers. The English teacher of the school who sat with us said that she teaches dancing too and that many teachers would "double hat" and teach an extra subject. The principal has attempted to solve this issue by scouting for volunteer teachers. Volunteer teachers are teachers not formally recruited by the education system but brought in by the school as substitutes that teach for a small allowance or completely voluntarily. He said that he had one teacher that travelled to the school all the way from Ampara and he would teach science across all grades. He also recruited a teacher to teach Tamil at the school and these teachers are compensated irregularly with the help of the school development society.

We did a brief visit to the library and IT Lab. We found that the IT lab had only one computer out of six functioning and the library too needed more help. There was no mobile signal in the school as it was quite a rural school. To say the least, it needed teachers and people to help them turn things around. On several occasions, the principal said that the children are smart and that they just need a functioning school to help them. The following are some pictures of the school, the market and a picture of David and Lily with the Principal of the school.

Bogahawewa Kanishta Vidyalaya

As I left the school, I got phone reception and had 5 missed call notifications from the principal of Bogahawewa. She was very keen on making sure we had not got lost! The drive there was beautiful, through fields with mountains in the distance and small village shops on the side of the road. The principal met us at the gate and took us straight in to visit the classrooms. The school used to be up until grade 9, but the Zonal Authorities wanted to make it a primary school. But, the principal had negotiated that they teach till grade 8 as most of the children in the area would find it hard to travel to schools in the town. The children that attended the school came from difficult backgrounds. It was a school with 105 students and 8 teachers.

The school was quaint and had a garden and field for the children and teachers to grow plants and trees that were relevant to the curriculum. The garden had flower beds made in shapes, which they used to teach the younger children. We went from class to class and met some of the kids and spoke to them. Ms Menaka, the principal was a go-getter. She had been a teacher in Wilgamuwa for many years and had been the principal at Bogahawewa since 2016. She explained there are ways in which they find solutions for the school, she maintains strong leadership and acquires the support of the school development society. Through the School Development society, they would lobby for support and change wherever needed. She explained that she is committed to working with the teachers to ensure that the children have some sort of better future. She refers to the teachers as her heroes.

At this school, we also met with a young volunteer teacher named Vikum, who had done his degree in Colombo in Buddhist Culture while doing an HRM diploma online. He has started teaching at the school without any compensation and teachers multiple subjects. I couldn't help but think, that we already have young people in these areas actually making strides in line with the mission of Teach For Sri Lanka in these schools.

Weheragalyaya Kanishta Vidyalaya

The last school we visited was Weheragalayaya and it was afternoon. The principal was not at the school and we met two teachers that showed us around. Weheragalyaya taught up to grade 11 and had 200 students and 11 teachers. In terms of physical resources, they asked for help with their IT lab and library.  One of the teachers was Sajith who I had met on my last visit. Sajith was a teacher who had served 5 years of his 10-year contract as a teacher and he had such a long contract because he was from Wilgamuwa and was a graduate teacher who had done an Economics degree at the University of Peradeniya. The other teacher was Kelum, who was from Polonnaruwa, which was a neighbouring district to Matale. He had completed his contract of 5 years as a teacher and wanted to transfer to a school in Polonnaruwa. They showed us around the school and similarly, Weheragalyaya had to recruit volunteer teachers and pay them through the school welfare. Both Sajith and Kelum taught multiple subjects including Maths, Business Studies and Science.

While walking around the school we found an open classroom space (see picture below), where a volunteer teacher was teaching dancing. An interesting anecdote that Sajith shared with us is that back in 2016, there were 60-odd young graduates from the Wilgamuwa/ Matale region that applied to be teachers in Wilgamuwa and wrote the selection exam. However only 2 were selected that year, he explained that if the ministry was flexible to allow more teachers from this region to teach, the shortage of teachers would not be this severe. 

All the schools needed help in terms of computers and library resources. At the moment Lily and David are organising a community to support contributions for these schools, so if you are interested in helping please reach out. We ended the day with a meeting with our board, and what a setting for our meeting. The visits to these schools really made me think about the impact the teachers and principals are making with what they have. Given the chance and proper support to create and initiate more change, it is very likely that they would.

That's all from me, this is Jeremy signing out. I hope to bring you more news and information about our work. So keep an eye out for more content.

Have a good week!