Kalmat Foundation employs an application-based selection process to identify the children we support and strives to provide for their basic educational needs until they complete 12th Grade. The students we support come from various Provinces within Sri Lanka.

The 11 local Ambassadors then connect with each selected child to ensure the child makes progress and remains in school despite competing priorities mandated by their family circumstances. Most of the children come from very poor homes where parents cannot afford to buy their school supplies and shoes.

A typical donation package consists of a pair of school shoes and one year’s supply of books/school necessities (pens, pencils, pencil sharpener, geometric set, ruler, eraser, single and double-ruled books, square-ruled books, white paper drawing book, set of coloring pens/pencils, set of coloring crayons, and white-out). We have partnered with a local shoe company, DSI, and provide DSI vouchers to the students to purchase the exact pair of shoes that are required by their respective schools. Additionally, we partner with several local bookstores to provide the books/school supplies.

We have donation events a couple of times a year. The main distribution of packages, however, typically occurs in November, where the CEO of Kalmat Foundation joins the local Ambassadors to host donation events in various schools and orphanages in multiple Sri Lankan Provinces.

In 2020, due to COVID-19, each local Ambassador traveled to the selected child’s home to donate the package as Sri Lanka is on high alert, with various government-imposed quarantine (and social distancing) measures in place. We have learned to adapt to each situation, and continue to strive to support the children who are in dire need, even more so during this COVID-19 pandemic.