We believe that the world needs many skilled professionals who do not require a university education and who must be equally respected and appreciated in society as those with. Sri Lanka’s education system does not currently operate that way as it encourages everyone to attempt university admission and, as a result, our society treats those without university qualifications as failures.

At the Avinya Foundation, we aim to create and deliver programs to empower the next generation of the workforce of Sri Lanka. We build and manage Avinya Academies to deliver world-class vocational education to under-privileged students left behind by the system.

The Avinya Foundation is a non-profit company registered as a Guarantee Company, headquartered in Colombo, Sri Lanka.

Read the Avinya Impact to better understand what we do and why we do it.

The Avinya Value Proposition

Avinya’s unique approach is to offer students a vocational career path as an alternative to post Ordinary Level students, in contrast to the traditional path of Advanced Level and tertiary education.

We give our students the environment and support to become English speaking, socially skilled and digitally fluent by equipping them with all the 21^st century skills expected by modern society and naturally available to the privileged.

The Timeline

The Avinya Foundation team has been hard at work since its inception in January 2022, to deliver the first Avinya Academy in January 2023.

• January 2022

  Initial conception, and Founding Team hired with seed capital from The Weerawarana Foundation.

• August 2022

  Commitment to start the first Avinya Academy in January 2023.

• September 2022

  Technology team begins development work on the Avinya School Management Stack to enable rapid and effective scaling.

• October 2022

  Construction started on the first Avinya Academy in Bandaragama. The Avinya Foundation (Gte.) Ltd. officially incorporated with the Registrar General of Companies in Sri Lanka.

• November 2022

  Student Admissions open to the public. The first Cohort of Avinya Academy Educators is onboarded, and Teacher Training begins.

• December 2022

  Student Admissions are in full swing, with Student and Family interviews being conducted near the campus site.

• January 2023

  The first academy, Avinya Academy – Bandaragama welcomes the first cohort of Avinya Students, and begins the journey of transforming Sri Lanka’s workforce.

Legal and Governance Structure

The Avinya Foundation is registered as a ↗Guarantee Company in Sri Lanka. In this structure, it is owned by its Members. The Members of the Guarantee Company appoint a Board of Directors, to act as its representatives and legal fiduciary.

Similar to a traditional corporation, the Board of Directors is responsible for the overall direction and strategy of the foundation, as well as being the legal fiduciary representative of the Members. The Board of Directors appoints an Executive Director (equivalent to the CEO) to manage and execute day-to-day operations in service of executing the Strategy prescribed by the Board.