Today (Friday 4th March) we were visited by ITV Central who contacted the school having heard about the collection of items for Ukraine that has been taking place all week. The school community has donated the equivalent to over 300 ‘bags for life’ with donations including, clothes, blankets, sleeping bags, toiletries, nappies, baby milk and medical supplies.
The push on donations was started on Monday by a Year 11 student Molly who has family living in western Ukraine, she approached Mr Cuomo and Mr Sheehan and the within two hours students and the wider community had been made aware of what donations they could bring in and leave in the chapel. To see the chapel full of donations by the start of school was a truly humbling moment – the donations were then transported to Doncaster by Mr Sheehan who dropped them off at his church, with the donations going onwards to a lorry heading for Warsaw. On Wednesday morning even more had been donated and again the chapel was full, with the help of a number of 6th Form Students, again Mr Sheehan loaded his car and headed to the drop off point in Doncaster. That lorry has now set off on its journey to Warsaw with our first two days’ worth of donations safely onboard.
Even more donations have come in on Thursday and Friday and it is these that can be seen in the ITV news footage and in the images below.
The students who were interviewed by ITV including Molly spoke so passionately about not being able to stand by and watch the humanitarian disaster unfold and that they had to do something and that is why they have continued to bring in their donations.
We were also joined by the Mayor of Mansfield Andy Abrahams, who praised the efforts of our students in responding to the needs of those people in Ukraine and those seeking refuge in Poland.
