On Wednesday March 10th the College held its annual Valedictory service to say farewell to the students and their families who are leaving.  This year there were 13 leavers (7 after the four year BTh course, one after a two year course, and 5 after a one year course.  The high point of the service is the washing of leavers feet by Faculty and other members of the TCL community.

Rosemary gave a leaving gift to Fr. Keerthi Fernando who has been on the Faculty of  TCL for nearly  15 years (including his higher studies in UK).  It was sad to say goodbye to such a very good friend and servant of TCL.

Here is Rosemary with the three female fourth year leavers, Grace from Mannar in the North West, Irene from Jaffna and Vathsala from Pussellawa in the tea country.  We have known them all since they came for interviews in November 2005, then for the April 2006 Orientation and then to begin their courses here in June 2006. It is by no means certain that any of them will go on to become ordained ministers.  Pressure on young women to marry is high and there is an understanding that the husband should have the higher status job.

After the service we shared a meal with the students in the Mess Hall.  Rosemary eats breakfast here when she teaches at 8am because walking home after chapel just to return very soon afterwards is not possible in the allotted time.  And, of course, it is an excellent opportunity to get to know the single students better.

We had our final meeting with our Fellowship Group on Monday 8th March.  Here are Vathsala (4th year), Malitha, Franklin and Suyathasan (1st years), Anil (2nd year) and Richard (4th year), pictured in our home..

The Diploma in Counselling and Group Work Skills, started so ably by Ina Watson and Malar Lawrence in 2005 in the wake of the tsunami, is still going strong despite both its founders returning to their native countries.  Rosemary has had the unenviable job of co-ordinating TCL's organisational role while some very able people have done the academic teaching.  It looks as through the course will continue to succeed.  This year's batch, shown here on Portfolio Day (Friday 19th March), was particularly good. This was on the last day of the 2009-10 course.