GOAL revitalises Sri Lanka schools

GOAL is undertaking a schools rehabilitation programme in Ampara District, Sri Lanka. With a budget of $7.5m the project will take approximately one year to complete. Seven months after Sri Lanka's unprecedented tragedy of December 26th 2004, there are signs of a society slowly getting back on it's feet. Amid the destruction wrought by the tsunami the humanitarian agency GOAL is rehabilitating sixty-four schools in the underdeveloped and neglected eastern province of Ampara.

With a budget of $7.5m the project is GOAL's biggest ever single project. It will have a significant impact on the lives of over 31,000 school children in the hardest hit community on the island, where livelihoods and lives were swept away in the terrifying ordeal.

Work has already started in several locations, directed by Ailbhe Gerrard, a project manager from Coolbawn near Nenagh in Co. Tipperary, Ireland. "Three of the schools had been directly hit by the tsunami wave, the force had smashed buildings leaving roofs hanging precariously over space where walls used to be, quarter structures standing abandoned and foundations exposed. Sixty one schools had hosted the thousands of refugees for weeks and in some cases months. These people needed shelter and had broken locks to enter classrooms, burnt wooden furniture to cook and heat water. There was extensive damage to latrines, water pipes and electrical fittings. " Read More ....



(Source: AlertNet)