This summer, Foundations for Joy is organizing a massive aid distribution operation in South Asia, looking to provide needed assistance to a dozen orphanages in Sri Lanka, as well as roughly a half dozen within India. For all complexes, with the exception of the three better established Prithipura sites, we will be working to provide basic necessities such as food, toys, furniture, and health supplies. Such materials provide a safer, more enjoyable environment for children, as well as enabling the orphanages themselves to refocus on improving the lives of the kids, rather than merely providing for a subsistence lifestyle.

In terms of toys and furniture, such supplies are conveniently affordable and have the potential to vastly improve the lives of a multitude of children for a minimal price. For a child who has had to make due for years with only sticks and rocks for entertainment, the introduction of toys serves not only to make playful relaxation more facile, but also to open up a world of possibility and imagination. When weighing the benefits of providing impoverished orphanages with basic furniture, it is important to consider the degree of improvement in lifestyle that such simple supplies can yield. Rather than being forced to make due with rusted out cots (often lacking any sort of padding), orphanages will be able to sport new beds, mattresses, or comfortable cots, serving to provide children with a substantive improvement in lifestyle.

With respect to the distribution of food supplies, water purifiers, and health supplies, Foundations for Joy is working with experienced public health officials to ensure that such supplies are properly allocated and distributed to ensure that they yield the most beneficial effects possible. Especially since we are working for children with mental and physical disabilities in an exceedingly impoverished area, such supplies are integral to ensuring the safety of the children.

Moreover, Foundations for Joy is working to provide increased educational opportunities for many of these abandoned kids, and is utilizing two methods of accomplishing this goal. Primarily, we are working to purchase and distribute enjoyable children's books to the kids to encourage reading while providing an additional avenue for entertainment. In addition, Foundations for Joy is working to distribute effective educational materials to all orphanages in hopes of making fundamental education of the children more expedient.

In the more developed facilities, Foundations for Joy is working to provide permanent, reliable sources of electricity to orphanages in Sri Lanka through the installation of solar generators. Many of these sites, such as the Cotagala Complex, which provides a home for hundreds of children, still do not have a source of electricity. Electricity is a vital resource, allowing for necessary medical equipment, lighting, cooling, sanitation, and professional training designed to assimilate abandoned kids back into society. A supply of electricity will make it possible to include new projects such as a carpentry workshop and a sewing center. Solar generators are not only more environmentally friendly and reliable than other electrical supplies, but also far cheaper than connecting isolated compounds to the electrical grid, allowing more funds to be more directly spent on children. Hence, the small gift of electricity will create vast improvements in the lives and livelihoods of society's most valuable asset; children.

The group is also helping to aid with structural renovations. Several buildings' roofs are in an extremely poor and unsafe condition, a problem that is compounded by leakage and further degradation experienced during the rainy season. Moreover, the children often suffer from the excess heat created by the low level of the roof. Prithipura has asked that the roof be raised if possible to allow greater ventilation, effectively solving the heat problem and increasing the safety and comfort of the children. Such essential renovations can have a hugely positive effect and can be easily funded by through small donations.