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The ICON• February Edition •2020/2021

Motivation Corner
Motivational quotes can help you reach your potential each day.
Sure, they’re just words.
But they’re positive words. And if you’re on the verge of giving
up or struggling to push yourself to the next level, sometimes
that’s just what you need.
So this is for you who are trying to finish a project, start a new
side hustle, or hit that big life goal, never give up!

“Don’t limit yourself. Many

people limit themselves to what
they think they can do. You can
go as far as your mind lets you.
What you believe, remember,
you can achieve.” – Mary Kay
Ash
The ICON• February Edition •2019/2020

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 The ICON• February Edition •2020/2021

Message from the

Vice President

First of all I thank our wonderful editorial team, for giving me the opportunity share a few words about my
Leo journey and to be a part of this amazing newsletter ICON – February edition.
When I recollected the memories of my younger self I was always the shy, introverted, least talkative
person who always answer a question with a smile. Fast forwarding my life twenty years I’m doing the
things I never imagined in my life that I would do because of this amazing platform that Leoism created for
the youth like us.
Being a youth comes with a set of challenges where emotions play an important part in our lives. Leoism
teaches us to take the responsibility and gives a sense of purpose to make us realize that there’s more we
can do for the betterment of people at such a young age while developing ourselves with the blessing we
get from our service to the others.
I would like to take this chance to thank all the amazing personalities I met through this movement
including my senior past club and district members who constantly shows us the path by living their lives
being an example to the younger generation like us.
I will end this small note with the following quote from Mahathma Gandhi which I always remember about
being a part of this wonderful movement.

“The best way to find yourself is to lose yourself to the service of others”

-Mahathma Gandhi –
So let us all celebrate being a part of this amazing movement and inspire the younger generation to be the
best version of themselves.
I would specially like to congratulate our editorial team, Leo Malika and Leo Udumbara for their exemplary
team work in compiling the ICON- February edition an amazing piece of work where our youngsters can get
an inspiration! -Leo Chanakya Ranasinghe-

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 The ICON• February Edition •2020/2021

The month of FEBRUARY

The Monthly General meeting for the month of February 2020-2021 was held on the 13th of February 2021
with the presence of chief guest Leo Mudith Jayasekara and Guest of honor Lion Anura Goonetilleke at
the Prime Engineering Lanka (Pvt) Ltd.

The specialty
of our meeting
was that it was
live online as
well

General
Meeting
FEBRUARY 2021

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 The ICON• February Edition •2020/2021

1 People to them and also how the above fact have

managed to execute the vision.
This project was done by using posters and

1 Vision
advertising videos which was shared through club
pages. The project lasted for a week and one day
was allocated to each club which it will be sharing
information through flyers on what service
means to each club under the hash tag
Cultural differences should not separate us from #1people1vision.
each other, but rather cultural diversity brings a
collective strength that can benefit all of
humanity” - Robert Alan – International
Culture is the characteristic of group of people Project
defined by everything such as language, religion,
lifestyle etc. Different people in different
societies have different culture but they also have
some similarities. The culture varies in different
things such as clothes, foods, religion and many
others. With the objective of learning about
different cultures and what leoism means to
different countries we decided to be a part of this
initiative.
The objective of the 1 people 1 vision project is to
unite Leo clubs from across the world as we
remind each other of the one vision that we all
Visit to Dewatagama Jumma Mosque-
share in common, which is SERVICE. Basically this
project is an awareness campaign where clubs
from around the world share what service means

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 The ICON• February Edition •2020/2021

Ergonomics (or human factors) is the scientific discipline concerned with the understanding of the
interactions among human and other elements of a system, and the profession that applies theory,
principles, data and methods to design in order to optimize human well-being and overall system
performance.”
-International Ergonomics Association Executive Council, August 2000
This project was done with the initiative of creating awareness among the Leos and public regarding the
importance of learning about the concept of ergonomics. We decided that we can reach a wider audience
if we make this as an educational video. Therefore that’s when we decided to make video containing facts
about the concept of Ergonomics.
The videos we released were all about how working from home can be changed with few effective yet
simple steps; make a change to your work place to add ease and functionality without dipping into your
wallet, the tips to create better use of daily practices to help yourself and everyone around you and the
phone is an item embedded into the daily usage. So a video on how we can prevent this usage from
causing harm to ourselves was introduced
If you missed any of the videos here are the links to watch them!
https://fb.watch/43ghziByvl/
https://fb.watch/43gtrOwtMq/
https://fb.watch/43gD9bm3ZE/
https://fb.watch/43gMls75dq/
https://fb.watch/43gTmy9GC/

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 The ICON• February Edition •2020/2021

ADAPT PHASE 1

Almost every country nowadays is facing the menace of Drug abuse. Whether it is
America, the most powerful country or it is Sri Lanka, one of the developing countries, the
problemThe ICON• February
bothers Edition •2020/2021
both alike.

So to address the issue of the standing problem which is the drug usage among youth of Sri
Lanka Leos of Polgasowita along with the National Dangerous Drugs Control Board of Sri
Lanka has decided to initiate a series of webinars addressing youth, school children and
parents. As Phase 1 of the project we decided to initiate this webinar aiming the youth who
are the leos and non-leos on the effects of drug usage in Sri Lanka. Mr. Pradeep
Koholangedara the assistant Director of the Preventive Education and Training unit of
National Dangerous Drugs control Board graced the occasion as the chief guest.

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 The ICON• February Edition •2020/2021

TALENT
Corner
An article on Climate Crisis and
Clean energy
Srilanka is a country rich in natural resources, blessed with unique collection of bio diversities which includes various
species of plants and animals. It is a known fact that population growth, corruption as well as the scarcity of laws
have led to the detriment of the environment creating number of environmental challenges for our country. Climate
crisis and the usage of clean energy can be considered as preeminent examples for such challenges.

Climate crisis is no doubt the ‘greatest challenge of our time’ and can be considered as a much bigger threat than
COVID 19. The biggest driver of climate change can be our burning fossil fuels which lead to the increase of the
concentration of greenhouse gasses like carbon dioxide to our atmosphere. This along with scenarios such as
clearance of land for agriculture is directly related to the change of temperature of our planet. Rising sea levels,
change of weather patterns, melting of ice and vanishing of species are all end results of climate change and if no
action is taken it will be judgment day for us soon. Natural processes lead to climate change, but the activities of
humans have led to climate change which is occurring at a rate higher than natural processes .

Global warming is the increase of temperature transpired due to natural processes, presently accelerating due to
human activities. The emission of fossil fuels is the main contributor to climate change. The reason behind this is
because; carbon dioxide is produced when fossil fuels are used to generate electricity. Another mode for the
generation of electricity is the destruction of forests and burning of forests. Chemical gasses such as Methane and
Nitrous oxides are by products from agricultural activities and the changes of land usage and also the release of
gasses such as CFC due to the industrial processes have contributed immensely to climate change. The above fact is
proved in a report by the IPCC which is “Srilanka’s National Communication to the Intergovernmental Climate
Change” where it was stated that land and forest change, energy transformation industries are the main
contributors to greenhouse gas emissions in Sri Lanka. The recent article published in the Daily Mirror Newspaper
dated March 5th 2021 states that scientific surveys have found out that the oxygen percentage in the atmosphere of
the Colombo city is gradually declining in proportion to its population, and the ministry of education has planned to
launch a tree planting programme to address this issue. The real question is, are we too late? I would like to
comment on this situation of the country based on what Chief Siettle once said . He said, “….. only when the last tree
has died and the last fish has been caught will we realize that we cannot eat money…” The statistics of the
temperature data of our motherland has shown that the temperature in Sri Lanka is increasing every decade by 0.16
Celsius and the trends of rainfalls have changed immensely which we experienced during the last few weeks with
less rainfall. It is a well-known fact that climate change affects sea levels and global temperature and a recent

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assessment by the IPCC states that this will continue for centuries even if greenhouse gas concentrations are
stabilized now that the damage is done.

Sources of energy include different types of non-renewable resources which are limited in supply and are
demarcated, like fossil fuels. On the other hand, renewable resources are not demarcated and include solar energy,
wind energy etc . The per capita energy in Srilanka has been substantially increasing every year for an instance in
2003 the total energy demand was contributed with the combination of biomass, hydro and petroleum. Along with
that a high percentage was from the industrial and transport sector of Sri Lanka whereas even the commercial,
household and other sectors too contributed. To address the clean energy issue in Sri Lanka the construction of
Srilanka’s first coal power plant is already in process while also introducing new sources of energy , increasing
efficiency and also reducing wastage would contribute towards energy conservation in Sri Lanka. Thermal power
generation is not the only driving force for air pollution, it is stated that even environment degradation such as soil
erosion and precipitation of reservoirs affects the energy sector. The most efficient example for this is the soil
erosion in the upper mahaweli that resulted in the downstream of the Polgolla reservoir as a result trapping at least
70% of the sediment. It is an already established fact that the usage of renewable energy sources plays the key role
to put an end note to greenhouse emissions and to stabilize the global climate. Already the world leaders have
introduced electric vehicles and hybrids as a stepping stone towards building a sustainable environment for all of us
to live in. As the youth of the community it is our duty to encourage green buildings to reduce the overall impact, not
only on the environment but also to the human health .

The constitution of Sri Lanka contains two references regarding the environment. Which are the directives principles
of State policy under Chapter 6 and the articles on Fundamental duties in the same chapter. Article 28 (f) states that
it is the duty of every Srilankan to protect nature and conserve its riches. But unfortunately, there is no direct
reference to the environment in the ‘Fundamental Rights’ chapter of the constitution neither is there an expressly
declared ‘right to life’ in the Constitution. I believe that legislations of the country play a huge role in the sustainable
development of a country therefore it is high time to develop legislation to protect the environment.

In conclusion,

“Everything that has ever happened in all of human history has happened on that pixel, our ability to live on planet
earth to have a future as a civilization. I believe this is a moral issue, it is your time to cease this issue, it is our time to
rise again to secure our future”.

Author- Leo Disali Gunasekera

Secretary

Leo Club of Polgasowita

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 The ICON• February Edition •2020/2021

By- Leo Malika Gamage

 The ICON• February Edition •2020/2021

REMINDER

BIG SPLASH!!!
The Annual Fundraiser of Leo Club of Polgasowita will be held
on the 21st of March2021 from 9am onwards at EcoZone
Pepiliyana located at 481 Sunethradevi Rd, Nugegoda.

JOIN US!

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 The ICON• February Edition •2020/2021

Message From the editors

It is with great pleasure we present the February edition of THE ICON official newsletter of Leo club of
Polgasowita for the fiscal year 2020/2021. We hope that after reading THE ICON each one of you could see the
wonderful events and projects we have successfully done together as one team. We may never know how much our
words and actions influence the lives of those around us. We must choose to be positive influence on others with
our maximum capacity!

We would like to extend our heartfelt gratitude to everyone who supported throughout the process of
preparing the newsletter!

We would like to conjoin this quote and remain,

“If people doubt how far you can go, go so far that you can’t hear them anymore”

Leo Udumbara Sunajanani Leo Malika Gamage

Co Editor Co Editor
Leo Club of Polgasowita Leo Club of Polgasowita

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