The OL Foundation
The OL Foundation
Informally called THE OL FOUNDATION, The Lawrence School Lovedale Alumni Foundation has been created and registered to officially receive donations from alumni and other bodies.
These will be used for various programmes, such as developing school infrastructure, providing scholarships, and participating in other charitable and OL community development activities and initiatives.
All work towards school progress
Based upon a resolution approved by the OLA general body at the AGM on May 24th, 2019, the Foundation was registered as a Trust with the Registrar of Assurances, Nilgiris at Udhagamandalam as Document No. 25 of 2020 on 20th November 2020.
The idea for the Foundation came as a result of the OLA not being able to directly collect, manage and donate to the school as and when needed for various expenses or projects. In the past, alumni directly donated funds to the school, and this presented challenges in the coordination, collection and dissemination of the funds. Further, the school found it challenging to keep separate accounts of these funds, and were unable to hold the funds collected as the funds would have to be invested within two years.
In consultation with the Headmaster, members of the OLA committee and OLs it was decided that a separate foundation that addresses these challenges be created.
The OL Foundation is created purely for the purpose of raising funds and using these for projects, supporting the requirements for improvement at school, and other associated areas. This allows for the OLA to undertake and successfully manage on-going fundraising initiatives and building of a corpus within this Foundation.
The OL Foundation also allows for the creation and management of seperate sub-corpus’ that are earmarked for different projects within the overall funds available. In doing so, various short and long term projects can be carried out at different times and for various purposes as required and deemed fit.
The OL Foundation is set up under the aegis of the OLA, but operates independently due to the nature of the projects it undertakes. To represent interests of the school, its associated bodies and the alumni community, and to allow for adequate checks and balances, the OL Foundation is governed by a Board of Trustees including members of the current OLA Committee, past Committee Members and the Headmaster (on an ex-officio basis). OL alumni members are also inducted as part of the operations team for communication, marketing, fundraising and investment activities.
To ensure complete and fair transparency in fundraising, operations and community engagement on various fundraising initiatives undertaken, audited accounts will be presented annually at the OLA Annual Generalbody Meeting. The OL Foundation, its Office and Members shall ensure excellent standards of governance and that no undue influence impedes the overall efforts and its goals.
The Foundation will shortly apply for exemptions under Section 12A and 80G of the Income Tax Act for donations from within India.