Hike For Hospice Donation (Photo provided by Danielle Gibbons)
Residential Hospice Grey Bruce is receiving a $3,000 donation from Ecole Catholique Saint-Dominique-Savio for its Hike For Hospice event.
The funds raised by the school will go towards covering Residential Hospice Grey Bruce’s operating costs.
The organization currently receives government funding to cover 50 per cent of their operating costs, and the school’s goal was to assist them in covering the other 50 per cent.
Residential Hospice Grey Bruce Donor Relations Amy McConachie says, the hike is an annual national event they run for all hospices and is the largest fundraiser of the year.
“It happens usually the first Sunday in May. Since the pandemic, we have had to adapt to new ways of fundraising and because we weren’t able to meet in person, we had it to a move your way for hospice, on your time and in your own way. Also reinventing the wheel, we decided to bring it into the schools,” says McConachie.
Teacher at the French Catholic school Danielle Gibbons says the funding started after having conversations with a colleague. She says they were planning on taking part in Hike for Hospice and the idea of fundraising was eventually brought in front of the other teachers, the principal, and later the students.
To promote the activity, students took part in a number of activities every Tuesday in May, which started with a dance-o-thon on May 10. Students were also given the chance to wear their hats, Halloween costumes, and pyjamas on other Tuesdays, and ending with a walk in the school neighbourhood on May 31.
Gibbons says through these events, they were able to blow past their initial goal.
“So originally, we were kind of worried, we were aiming for $500 because that’s kind of about how much we raised for Terry Fox so I kind of started there. Then once we launched the activity, I noticed pretty quickly that the donations were coming in, so I bumped up our goal to $1,000, that was reached pretty quickly within the first two weeks. I then bumped it up to $1,800, which that last weekend we reminded parents and on that last weekend we managed to go up to $3,000,” says Gibbons.
Gibbons says on May 31, they had an assembly which they revealed to the students how much they were able to raise.
McConachie says Saint-Dominique-Savio was one of two schools that took part in the opened up version of Hike for Hospice and was the best fundraiser.
“With Covid, everything kind of calmed down, everyone kept to their classrooms, everyone did their own thing. With the Hike for Hospice, I think that brought out the family feeling that we were used to having before Covid,” says Gibbons. “Being a small school, we are able to do things like that and Hike for Hospice brought that back out. I think the other thing is, a lot of our families have probably also had experiences, sadly with the local hospice. So I think in that way, it went to reach families on a more personal level.”
“These funds help us keep the lights on, the door open, food on people’s plates, and allows us to keep providing excellent palliative care in our community,” says McConachie.
