Carleton instructor assists Sri Lankan tsunami victims

by Nicole Findlay

While the world looked on in horror after the December 26 tsunami, Carleton Instructor Chitra Sekhar decided to do more than make a donation.

In May 2005,Chitra Sekhar, a child psychotherapist and play therapist, went to eastern Sri Lanka to work directly with the tsunami’s victims.

“Getting worked up won’t solve it, so I felt I needed to do what I could in my own way,” said Chitra. “That is to train the frontline workers as I have done before.”

Chitra has developed programs to assist front-line psychosocial workers working with children living in conflict situations. These include children with a history of family, or societal violence as well as those affected by natural disasters. Over a four-week period, Chitra trained Sri Lankan psychosocial workers in the town of Batticaloa to alleviate some of the trauma children had experienced as a result of the tsunami.

The program relied on play-therapy techniques using natural, renewable resources like sand, water and plants and was based on Sri Lankan cultural values and belief systems. Over the course of a month, the program participants learned the techniques by engaging directly in the process. The trainees also worked on some of their own reactions to the disaster and gained a better understanding of how the play would heal the children they would be working with. In addition to using readily available resources, Chitra was involved in the creation of a training video that will teach her trainees the techniques to train the next generation of front-line workers. This ensures the programs can be easily delivered in situations where funding and equipment are scarce.

Born in India, Chitra immigrated to Canada in 1982. She joined Carleton’s Department of Directed Interdisciplinary Studies in 2002. She has developed and teaches two courses, Child Rights, and Children in Conflict. She plans to return to Sri Lanka in January to offer the second phase of training.