About us
Young people doing the work, not waiting their turn.
Leo Multiple District 306 is the youth organization of Lions Clubs International across Sri Lanka and the Maldives: young people leading service in the communities they come from.
1969
First club
The Leo Club of Wattala, chartered in Sri Lanka.
12
Districts
Redistricted from six in 2025.
210+
Clubs
Serving island-wide, in schools, universities and towns.
2
Countries
Sri Lanka and the Maldives, since 2023.
Our origin
From one club of cricketers to two countries
Leo Multiple District 306 has a history of its own, and it starts more than a decade before the multiple district had districts at all.
1969
The first club
The Leo Club of Wattala, formed by a team of cricketers, was chartered as the first Leo club in Sri Lanka. Lions clubs took to the programme and opened the way for more.
1978
Room to grow
There were enough clubs to divide the multiple district and ease the administration of it. It became 306 A and 306 B.
1989
A third district
306 C was established from parts of 306 A and 306 B.
2005
Six districts
The multiple district was divided again into six: A1, A2, B1, B2, C1 and C2. Each set out to grow its membership without trading quality for numbers.
2023
The Leo Club of Malé
The extension programme set out to open the movement to young leaders in the Maldives, and to take the Sri Lankan Leo movement somewhere it had never been. The first Leo club in the Maldives was formed in 2023: a new culture, a new community, and a new nation in which to build leaders.
Directed by Multiple District President Leo Rahul Attanayake PFLM, and chaired by Leo Lakisha Perera PFLM, then District Vice President of Leo District 306 C2.
2025
Twelve districts
The six were divided again into twelve, the structure the multiple district works in today.
Today
Over 210 clubs
Clubs serve island-wide (Colombo, Jaffna, Trincomalee, Batticaloa and the south among them) in schools, in universities and institutes, and in the towns themselves.
How we are organized
Three levels, one name
Each level is accountable to the one above it. The work itself happens at the smallest.
Multiple District
Leo Multiple District 306 sets direction, standards and national programmes across both countries, and represents MD 306 to Lions Clubs International.
Districts
Twelve districts carry the work regionally, each coordinating its own clubs and service calendar. See the district index for the area each one covers.
Clubs
Clubs are where service happens: local teams of Leos planning and running projects in their own communities.
Who we are
Three kinds of club, two age tracks
Every Leo club is chartered and sponsored by a Lions club, and run entirely by its own members. What differs is where a club is based, and which age track it charters on: Alpha or Omega, never both.
Alpha track
School clubs
Chartered at a school, with the school's permission and a teacher beside the Lions advisor. The members elect their own officers and choose their own projects.
Omega track
University and institute clubs
Chartered at a university, a campus or an institute. Undergraduates run these at the scale a campus allows, and much of the service that crosses a whole district starts in one.
Omega track
Community clubs
Chartered on a town or a city rather than an institution, and open to anyone in the area who is eligible. The first Leo club in Sri Lanka, at Wattala in 1969, was one.
- Chartered by a Lions club
- No Leo club exists without a sponsoring Lions club. That charter is the link to Lions Clubs International.
- Funded by its own members
- Clubs raise what their projects cost, and decide what those projects are.
- One Leo year
- Officers are elected for a single term, running July to June.
What we stand on
What the three letters stand for
Stated in the order the programme states them. Every project a Leo club runs is one of the three, and most are all three.
Leadership
Developing the skills of young people to lead communities.
Chairing the meeting, holding the budget, standing in front of the room.
Experience
Gaining practical experience through impactful volunteerism.
Service that is planned and carried out, not attended. The project is the classroom.
Opportunity
Creating pathways to bridge community gaps and build global networks.
Training, conferences, and a network across both countries and the wider Lions family.
What we are part of
One question, asked in Chicago in 1917
Melvin Jones asked a business club what it would be if it looked beyond its own members. The association that answered became Lions Clubs International. The Leo programme grew out of it in 1957.
Leading for Life.