ASSOCIATION OF SRI LANKAN GRADUATES OF CANADA
SECRETARY'S ANNUAL REPORT FOR THE YEAR 2000.

· Executive Committee Meetings

The executive committee met at least once a month for the period from January to November at the residences of the members arranged on a rotation basis.

· Fund Raising Events

On May 14, a benefit film show was screened and a fund of $ 1457.00 was collected to help Jaffna university for their educational facilities. Due to the on-going problems in Sri Lanka, the Association was unable to obtain the details of the required educational materials from the Jaffna University and is awaiting for the reply from them.

On August 19, 2000, the Association conducted a fund raising event successfully at the parking lot opposite Dominion store near Neilson-Ellesmere intersection and donated $ 1500.00 to the Centenary Health Centre Foundation which has purchased a special wheel chair on the Association's name. Car wash, barbecue and sale of used items were the main events. Simultaneously, a truckload of used clothes was also collected and donated to the Salvation Army. Many children of the Association members participated at the event and they were issued with certificates appreciating the volunteer work. We commend the efficient work done by most of the committee members and thank them for the same.

· Donations

Twenty years issues of National Geographic Magazines were donated to the Heartley College Past Pupils' Association for their college library.

· Seminars

A seminar on "Diabetes" was conducted by the Association on November 25, 2000 at the Scarborough Civic Centre. We thank the Canadian Diabetes Association and Bayer's Pharmaceutical Inc. for their presentation and participation in the seminar. We also thank Dr. Siva Mahesan, Dr. Pon Sivaji and Mr. Sri-Guggan-Sri-Skanda-Rajah for giving wonderful speeches and participating at the seminar.

· Website for the Association

A website named "asgc.ca" was registered and started running from November 16, 2000. Information and the facilities at the site will be progressively expanded. Our sincere thanks go to Arun Theivendrarajah for designing and building up the web site for us.

· Newsletter

Association newsletter "Focus" was published once in April 2000 and again in December 2000. The Association thanks the editors Siva Markandu and Raja Mahendran for their time and the excellent work done with limited resources.

· Badminton and Yoga classes

For the last 5½ years, we organized playing badminton game for 2 hours on every Thursday and performing Yoga exercises for 1 hour on every Sunday. These were conducted at the schools and unfortunately, due to unexpected rental fee hike introduced by the TDSB, we were compelled to stop these physical exercise programs temporarily. Association appreciates the job well done by Kanagavarathan and Raja Mahendran for organizing the programs. We have represented at the public hearings arranged by the TDSB joint working group held on November 02, 2000 to voice our protest about the rental hike.

· Membership

Currently there are 181 members including 7 life members in the Association. We request the members to contact us and update their addresses and phone numbers. Furthermore, please bring in your university batch mates/friends who haven't yet joined the Association.

We thank the committee members for their untiring efforts and the support rendered in all the activities of the Association. Also, we thank the members of the Association and the Tamil community for supporting our events. Our special thanks go to the Tamil newspapers and the radio stations for supporting our programs.

(Ram) C. Ramanathan

Secretary