Unawatuna Maha Viduhala School

22 Mar 2005

This mixed school is perhaps 2 kilometres back from the shore, on the edge of Unawatuna. Although the school buildings themselves were not directly affected by the Tsunami, one of the teachers was killed, and of course many children were affected.

Matt Rose first visited the school in the second week of January, and met amongst others the Principal and English teacher Wimal. The main problem at the school at this time was a lack of space to accommodate displaced pupils from damaged schools, including the destroyed Unawatuna beach side school, although two classrooms had lain unused for some time. As they had no ceiling the rooms had been taken over by birds and become unusable.

FoU funded the cleaning up of the rooms, installation of new suspended ceilings, redecorating the refurbishing with desks and chairs. Additional carpentry skills and labour were provided by a group of parents who worked long into many nights to complete the work. Both classrooms are now operational and being used as English rooms by Wimal.

In addition Matt was able to provide 12 months internet access, to provide improved communication as part of the English curriculum, and on a personal level some training for Wimal in the local internet cafe! Friends of Unawatuna have since built a computer lab containing 10 computers, and have funded an IT teacher for a year to train up, not only students but the teachers as well. We would like to wish Prasad good luck in his new role.

At the request of the Principal, one of the refurbished classrooms has been dedicated to the teacher who died.

There are several other projects that we are currently working with the school to complete, including a perimetre wall to keep out roaming animals and people and to keep the school children from accidentally wandering onto the railway line which is very close to the school grounds; further computers for the school; a new toilet block (the existing one is shown below); and mains water to enable the children to get fresh drinking water at school instead of relying on carrying their own..

Click here to review the Thank you letter sent to the Friends of Unawatuna

Because the school excels in Rugby and Netball at a competition, it was deemed suitable to purchase the school some team Rugby shirts and netballs shirts. We have since ordered boots, shoulder pads, and head gear. Wimal is thrilled and the boys even more. The team played in a tournament last weekend and came in first. Well done and congratulations to all who played.

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