3 days ago
York teenagers prepare to fly 6,000 miles for East Africa volunteer work
TEENAGERS from a York school are preparing to fly more than 6,000 miles to do community and volunteer work in East Africa.
Nineteen students from Archbishop Holgate's School are embarking on the once-in-a-lifetime trip to Uganda after raising thousands of pounds to cover the costs.
Pupils from Years 9, 11 and 12 are going on the adventure in early July for two weeks, travelling with the Christian-based charity Abaana which invests in children in Africa, helping them to break the chains of poverty through education.
The group will undertake a range of volunteer work, which will include painting both the inside and outside of a primary school building.
School show, The Masked Singer, helped boost their fundraising efforts (Image: Submitted)They will also be teaching and running a range of activities and experiences for primary school children in the town of Kuluba, a sub-county in the Koboko district of Uganda.
Group members are paying for their own flights, accommodation and food and will be staying in one of Abaana's guesthouses on the outskirts of Kampala.
They have also raised money for the renovation materials for the primary school and to buy resources and gifts to take on the adventure.
Each student threw themselves into a range of challenges, including scaling great heights and throwing themselves out of a plane, to bring in the pounds.
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Joanna Kitney, assistant headteacher and trip lead, said: "It's been so impressive to see them working hard to ensure we meet our aim.
'Brodie Barrow cycled a mile a day for a month, Oscar East has been sorting and selling items on EBay, Reuben Stockdale and Miles Hall walked the Three Peaks.
'Charlie Summers has completed a sponsored bike ride, Charlotte Brannan and Dora Escombe have been busy making and selling homemade products to family and friends and Bryn Wade did a parachute jump.'
As a team, the group has also run whole school events which included The Masked Singer show in December and a school disco in April. Collectively both events made more than £1,000.
Students who helped to organise the fundraising school disco (Image: Submitted)
The group also has a JustGiving page which has received more than £2,400 in donations.
To donate to the students' fundraising efforts, visit
It is not the first time students from Archbishop Holgate's School have travelled to far-flung destinations to do overseas volunteer work.
Back in 2012, pupils from the school, which is named after one of the city's most famous clerics, went to South Africa to do community and voluntary work in schools and orphanages.
The group of ten Year Ten students were joined by teachers Richard Nihill and Hannah Turvey as they visited the Diocese of Cape Town for two weeks, and got the chance to meet the city's Nobel Prize-winning former archbishop, Desmond Tutu who was taking a small service at the city's cathedral.
