The Sunday Post: Hospice News

Longhaugh kids are all stars in our eyes

By Kathryn Mainds

THE GENEROUS pupils at Dundee’s Longhaugh Primary are stars in our eyes after their tremendous fund-raising efforts.

On Friday, the school handed over a cheque for an incredible Ł1500 to Diane Wallace from CHAS, to go towards building Robin House.

And it was the pupils themselves, not the teachers, who decided to donate the money to our appeal.

After hearing about the work that goes on in Rachel House, they knew it was a worthy cause and wanted to do their bit to help build Scotland’s much-needed second children’s hospice.

Alister Watson as Bob the Builder,
Shannon Shankland as Avril Lavigne,
James Heenan and Linsey Walker present
Longhaugh Primary’s cheque to
CHAS representative Diane Wallace.

Head teacher Linda Nicoll explains, “We always have collections at our end of term assemblies and we like the pupils to be involved in deciding where the money goes.

“So the teachers gave the pupils a choice of three charities and then told their class about each of them, and CHAS got the most votes.”
Pennies

But, as well as the end of term collections and a jar in each classroom into which pupils regularly pop their pennies, the head teacher decided to devote a whole day to raising money for CHAS towards the end of last term.

The youngsters were thrilled when they heard they could wear their play clothes for a day, rather than their usual school uniform — but at a cost!

Linda smiles, “We said they’d be fined 50p for not wearing their uniform. However, the pupils decided it was only fair that the staff were fined Ł1 as well.”

The pupils then spent the whole morning in the gym hall creating a penny mile by lining up all the pennies they’d collected.

The secretaries then had to count all the pennies and trek to the bank with bucketloads of coins.

After the pupil’s sterling fund-raising efforts, Linda reckoned her pupils deserved a treat in the afternoon to round off the day.

Linda said, “We decided to have a Stars In Their Eyes contest as a reward.

“Every class held auditions and voted for the star to represent them in the contest.”

The pupils then enjoyed a fun-filled afternoon with performances from Atomic Kitten, Busted and Girls Aloud, to name just a few.
Difficult task

The school’s lollipop men and ladies were given the difficult task of choosing the winners.

In the infant school Shannon Shankland as Avril Lavigne won the day, with Alister Watson, as Bob the Builder, runner-up.

And when the money raised at the fun day was added to total, it tallied up to Ł1500.

Not bad at all for a school with 350 pupils.

Linda beams, “We’re very proud of the pupils and the amount they raised. The fun day was great, the pupils and staff enjoyed raising the money and we’re really pleased it’s going to a great cause.

“It’s been a really good effort and we’re grateful for the parents’ support.”

You can e-mail us at: hospice@sundaypost.com