Horizon Lanka Foundation started its fifth Horizon Academy in Maniyanthoddam, Jaffna, Nallur, Sri Lanka in June, 2018. Father S. M. Sebastian OMI, Parish Priest who is a dynamic priest who does a lot for the students and the community at large in the village through his hard work. He already had another academy called Eugene Academy and all we had to do was to use its premises and resources to establish Horizon Academy there.
The running cost of the Horizon Academy here per month is around 25,000 LKR | 156.68 USD | 133.90 EUR. This cannot be recovered from the students as their parents get a very low salary or in most cases, no salary at all. Besides, this is a village that was reduced to rubble during the bitter civil war and people still face a lot of financial issues. So, we have decided not to charge a fee from the students here till the end of December here. After that, we will charge 100 LKR | 0.63 USD | 0.54 EUR per month from a student. If we get 100 students per month, we would be able to get only 10,000 LKR | 62.67 USD | 53.56 USD. This will cover part of the monthly expenses from January, 2019.
Since we cannot afford to pay the teachers, we depend on local and foreign volunteers to teach English and ICT here. So far, three foreign volunteers have taught the children in this Academy. They were Ms. Clara Charriere, Ms. Pauline Oswald and Ms. Laurie Kuhne from France and Ms. Ashwini Balan from Singapore. Ms. Emilie Østmo from Norway is the present volunteer here. We expect more local and foreign volunteers to join us soon.
The foreign volunteers teach English free of charge in the public schools in the mornings and this is totally free of charge for all the students in those schools. The students come to Horizon Academy in the evenings. Foreign volunteers teach throughout the week days and local volunteers can help teach these students English, ICT, science, mathematics, fine arts and sports during weekends. For the local volunteers, the villagers will provide food and accommodation free of charge. (Foreign volunteers pay the host families for their food and accommodation.)
The students have to pay the above fee for attending Horizon Academy from January, 2019 as there are some costs involved in the Academy such as electricity, internet, telephone, stationary, transport, entertaining guests, etc. So, if any of you could help us with these expenses, please email us on info@horizonlanka.org. (All contributions and expenses will be recorded, audited and shared with the donors and other stakeholders.)
Nanda Wanninayaka, The Founder and the Chairman of the Horizon Lanka Foundation
