SLYPA has been and continues to be focused on tackling three main issues: (1) solving the problem of disconnect; (2) ensuring continuity in the community; and (3) bridging the cultural gap.
Solving the Problem of Disconnect
The Sri Lankan young professional community in the US is widely dispersed and largely disconnected. At the local level, many Sri Lankan young professionals have no means of locating, let alone communicating with, other like-minded professionals in their respective cities. SLYPA has been tremendously successful in providing a means by which young professionals can meet and interact with other professionals of common heritage and background on a regular basis in their respective cities, and in the process develop personal and professional relationships that will last a lifetime. Through SLYPA, communities are created and developed, which otherwise may never have formed.
While groups of Sri Lankan young professionals live in different parts of the country, there has been no real or sustained level of communication among the different groups in each city. SLYPA helps to first form communities on the local level, and then provides a means by which these distinct local communities can be tied together on a national level as well.
A national network of Sri Lankan young professionals, with strong local ties, creates a talent and knowledge pool that is both deep and vast, and with virtually unlimited potential. The collective minds of SLYPA members working together can accomplish a great deal of good for the greater Sri Lankan community, not only in the United States, but also in Sri Lanka and around the world.
Ensuring Continuity in the Community
The individuals who left Sri Lanka and immigrated to the United States in search of a better life in the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s literally created the greater Sri Lankan community that we know today from the ground up.
The tremendous accomplishment of these leaders cannot and should not be overlooked. These pioneering Sri Lankans left everything they knew in the motherland, including homes, friends, and family, and built a new community in the United States from scratch. This was achieved in a number of ways. First, individuals and families who knew each other from Sri Lanka or met each other in the United States through school or work met regularly for various occasions and thereby forged deep and enduring relationships. Second, those individuals formed different cultural, religious, social, and professional organizations around the country specifically catered to the interests of the Sri Lankan community. These dual, but overlapping social circles, served the important function of bonding individuals together and creating a sense of community.
The founders of the community were able to successfully integrate themselves into American society, while still preserving the core values and traditions that are at the heart of Sri Lankan culture (e.g. religion, family, food, art, dance, music, language).
Naturally, these values were instilled and nurtured in their children – the first generation of Sri Lankans to be born and raised in the United States. One of the main challenges that we face as a community today is ensuring that the Sri Lankan values and traditions that the founders worked so hard to preserve do not dwindle away over time as future generations grow up in the United States.
As young Sri Lankans progress through the US educational system and ultimately enter into the workforce, their connection to the community often becomes more and more tenuous. SLYPA strives to unite the diaspora of young professionals and recreate a sense of community and cooperation that was first developed by the founders of the community decades ago.
SLYPA further helps ensure the continuity of the Sri Lankan community by bridging the gap between young professionals and the pioneering leaders who came before them.
As the founders and current leaders of the various cultural, religious, social, and professional Sri Lankan organizations around the country approach retirement, the torch of leadership must be passed in order to ensure the continued success of those organizations. The future is in the hands of young professionals, who bring new and fresh ideas to the table, along with the energy, training, and ambition to put those ideas to work. SLYPA’s membership is deep with individuals who have the experience, ability, and desire to become the next generation of leaders in the community.
By the same token, the current leaders of our community can be wonderful mentors, resources, and teachers for bright, ambitious, young professionals around the nation. SLYPA acts as a conduit for the knowledge, wisdom, values, and experiences of the founders of our community to flow directly to the young professionals and college students who are coming up through the ranks.
By working together - founders and young professionals - side by side, the Sri Lankan community will endure and continue to grow and evolve for generations to come.
Bridging the Cultural Gaps
A sense of kinship is vital to the sustainability of any immigrant population because the bonds that are derived from shared common heritage provide a foundation on which a community can stand and grow. Unity provides strength.
Although the rhetoric of unity is frequently used by Sri Lankans when the situation calls for it, the reality is that our community has been segmented via ethnic lines into distinct communities as an unfortunate result of the ongoing conflict and political situation in the motherland. Although there are certainly exceptions to every rule, there is typically little overlap or communication between Tamil, Sinhalese, and Muslim communities in the United States, despite the shared and common Sri Lankan ancestry.
SLYPA has been able to overcome the rhetoric of unity and turn it into a reality by bridging the cultural gaps. SLYPA includes members of all backgrounds, including Sinhalese, Tamils, Burghers, and Muslims; Christians, Buddhists, and Hindus. One way SLYPA taps into this diversity is by sharing information about various ethnic/religious events in different communities, which permits members who may otherwise never have attended those events to meet and get to know their countrymen.
SLYPA members are able to work together by overlooking any historical biases and by recognizing and embracing the differences among the cultures as a strength, not weakness of the community.