Taking Care of 50 Vulnerable Sri Lankan Children

As Sri Lanka gets ready to celebrate the island’s New Year, the Sunshine Charity is rejoicing additionally to a second jubilation - having its primary project, the Sunshine Day Care Centre being granted pre-school status by the Eastern Province Pre-school Education Bureau. The wonderful news came soon after the charity was awarded three badges by GlobalGiving – “top-ranked, proven effective and vetted” for the year 2018. What an honour for the organization!

Looking back, when we began the journey fifteen years ago, operating in a make-shift shed under a mango tree to take care of children affected by the tsunami followed by children affected by the protracted civil war and now taking a more broader approach to include vulnerable children affected by challenging situations, we are proud to acknowledge  that a small organizations like The Sunshine Charity has contributed immensely to break the cycle of poverty for disadvantaged communities, particular children living in the eastern province of Sri Lanka.

Helping vulnerable communities to make the right choices like spending more on food, health and education and less on unnecessary goods has created for them a new set of values and beliefs. Making families understand that sending children to work or, allowing them to idle at home will in no way help them to come out of the poverty trap has contributed equally to the process. In discussing these issues, it is important to find solutions. In staying focus to achieve the impact of the organizations goals and objectives, we have continued to provided a safe place for our children to play and interact with other children, provided them with one nutritious meal, a glass of milk, educational material and more recently conducted workshops for the pregnant mothers living in the community as well as parents in general on understanding the needs of children. This allowed for the paradigm shift.

When we refer to early childhood education, its importance is often related to children growing up under normal circumstances. Very rarely do we relate its importance to children living in vulnerable communities. There are many reasons for this. Sometimes, we forget that these children are equally important; sometimes it is because they live marginalized, hardly heard or seen so we forget to recognize them. Pockets of programmes take care of their needs but an overall recognition of equal access to child care and education is overlooked. State policies may well be in place but implementing them in total is ignored at many levels.

Providing early childhood education for rural, vulnerable children is perhaps the only way to get out of the poverty cycle. It was a big day therefore for the Sunshine Children when some of them celebrated their graduation. Dressed up in the traditional graduation gown, they were so excited to be presented with the much-awaited graduation certificate. Their next destination – the local primary school. We are told that the children who transfer from the sunshine day care have many advantages. They are confident, cry out for help without being shy, interact openly making friends easily and have the basic skills to help them settle down.

Parents of the children are aware what this means to the family and in particular, the long-term benefits and impact it has on their children. For the children, it was no doubt the biggest day in their early childhood experience and one they will not forget!