Girl Power!

TEA Project Director Racheal & project Trustee Dee spoke today at a rally in the town of Badulla; the heart of Sri Lanka's tea country. The event was promoting awareness of recent changes to the Sri Lankan constitution that ensures women have greater representation in government elections.

TEA are grateful to The POWER Foundation for inviting the project to speak.

We will hopefully be able to announce news shortly of key partnership developments between The POWER Foundation & The TEA Project that will bring our LIFE Training and empowerment services throughout the Uva Province.

#GirlPower!

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SAFE @ CCH

CCH: Centre for Children's Happiness.

TEA took child protection training to Sri Lanka's Capital, Colombo; supporting CCH to train student social workers attending 'RAINBOW'. (Holistic Child Development Programme).

Students received child protection training; creating action plans on what student Social Workers can do now and what the Government can do to keep children SAFE.

In Sri Lanka social work is not a recognised profession; students commonly graduate into teaching. The RAINBOW Programme is helping to develop the role of Social Workers at Government level. It was a pleasure & privilege to be a part of this vital development in Child services.

Thank you to everyone at CCH.

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SAFE Refuge

The TEA Project has presented SAFE Training to staff at a women's refuge this week & another local school supported by the project in the Central Province.
By the end of the week we will have also visited the Capital, Colombo, and have moved up into the Highlands. There we will present our safeguarding children training to staff from a national charity.

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SAFE-TEA Training Begins!

The TEA Project has started a month of SAFE Training with professionals from the Sri Lankan education and Charity sectors. SAFE provides skills for adults to recognise, deal effectively and prevent abuse of children.

All the training is being presented in 3 languages (Sinhala, Tamil & English) & led by Dee, an experienced Consultant Social Worker volunTEAring with the project from the UK. Dee is supported by a TEAm of local volunTEArs & project staff to help her facilitate and translate.

This week the project was further strengthened with the arrival of Nicola, a senior schools inspector from the UK. Nicola provided an additional 2 day teacher training programme that ran alongside SAFE. The week culminated at a partner school on the West coast before the TEAm headed back to Kandy.

Next week we journey from Kandy to the capital, Colombo, before travelling into the highland tea plantations. Here SAFE will be complimented by adding the project's leadership programmes 'LIFE' and 'Training the Trainers' to the schedule.

In all The TEA Project will visit 10 locations in the Central, East and Western provinces.

This programme was made possible because of public support to The TEA Project's SAFE-TEA FIRST Appeal.

Thank you to those people who donated.

Our hope is to extend SAFE Training throughout 2017.

Follow the link to get involved & support SAFE:

https://mydonate.bt.com/fundraisers/safetea

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Fighting Poverty: Sri Lanka's Tea Estate Workers Demand Pay Increase.

'My people should not die in enslavement or poverty'.

The TEA Project will take our 'SAFE Children Training' high into the Sri Lankan TEA plantations later this month. SAFE trains professionals & parents on how to recognise, deal and effectively prevent physical & mental abuse in children. This essential training is only possible because of public support to our SAFE-TEA FIRST Appeal.

https://mydonate.bt.com/fundraisers/safetea

The TEA Project is in the process of building strong partnerships that will extend our reach into this poverty stricken area in 2017 where the average wage for a plantation worker is a mere 620 rupees (£3.39/$4.14) for a relentless day of grueling, dangerous toil. We plan to announce news soon that will open access to empowerment services for thousands more vulnerable children.

This recently released article explains the current situation of tea plantation children, their families & communities living through a forgotten plight.

""Malnutrition among children from estate worker families is high, says T. Devendran, principal of Kadawala Vigneshwara College in Ginigathhena, where Sathyawathy's children attend school.

"Most of the plantation workers' children don't get the proper nutritious food when they grow up," he says. "The malnourished child grows up to be a malnourished mother and father and this will lead to a generation of malnourished people."

Basic education is often out of reach for the students of tea estate workers, even when the schooling is offered for free and each child receives a set of school uniforms, he says. Other costs, such as additional uniforms, shoes, exam fees and more, must all be paid by the family.

"This affects the child's mentality and pushes them to a state where they isolate themselves from others,"

Read the full article: http://www.srilankannews.net/news/250849271/fighting-poverty-sri-lanka-tea-estate-workers-demand-pay-increase

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