Kilgraston celebrates Goals Day 2021
Each year Kilgraston focuses on one of the five Sacred Heart Goals, with Goals Day an opportunity for the whole school to spend time working on projects and in groups to learn about the year’s theme in more detail, hear from influential people in that field and work on action plans.
This year’s Sacred Heart Goal is ‘Community’ and this term we have focused on the idea of community in terms of our relationships with each other, charity and environmental awareness.
Upper Sixth have just led a Charities Week for the school, which has involved every year group researching and presenting information about a charity they would like to support throughout the year.
This information has been turned into artwork and information posters (displayed in various locations throughout the school) as well as a special video about the different charities. Upper Sixth also brought back iPray24, but this time as iPray12+12. The Side Chapel was beautifully arranged and decorated into a range of prayer stations, whereby individuals or classes could come and visit from 7.00am-7.00pm over two days.
Charities Week culminated in this term’s ‘Goals Day’ on Thursday 7th October, where we celebrated our own Kilgraston community with a range of fun activities, including a charity ‘Soak the Staff and Upper 6’ fundraiser for CHAS!
We were honoured to welcome Anya Hart Dyke, our special guest speaker for the day, who inspired our junior and senior pupils with engaging and interactive talks about the environment. Anja
We were also inspired by Upper Four Katie’s presentation about her parents’ farm, which then led into a goal-setting session to support the UN’s International Day of the Girl. The chaplain was very grateful to the Head Girl Team and Upper 6 for their wonderful contributions to the planning and delivery of all these events – a brilliant demonstration of community!
Macmillan Coffee Morning 2021
Kilgraston has participated in the Macmillan Coffee Morning 2021, to raise money for cancer support. This year was a massive success raising over £400. Thank you to everyone who came along and supported the event, by baking or donating. A massive thanks to Upper Sixth’s Sana the community and charity prefect for organising this event, alongside School Secretary Mrs Harrison and Head of English Ms Hall who also contributed greatly. Thanks also to Kilgraston’s in-house catering team, Inspire, for their delicious hot chocolate and to all the bakers who provided the delicious treats. Sana is looking forward to more charity events that Kilgraston can be a part of, including our upcoming charity week.
Kilgraston has supported many different charities in recent years and you can find out more about them here
Isla, Upper Sixth, Marketing Prefect
Enterprise skills in Juniors
Lower Third recently sharpened their enterprise skills and raised over £600 in the process – an outstanding achievement for a class project by eleven pupils.
The class held fairs where the sold items including hand-made jewellery, arts and crafts. With the two enterprise sessions, the class made £672.10, and donated it to charity, Alzheimer Scotland. Fiona Matthews, Alzheimer Scotland Dementia advisor for Perthshire, thanked the pupils for their donation and said:
“It is very much appreciated and will enable the organisation to continue to support people living with dementia and their families in the area.”
The donation will help the charity in a number of ways, including continuing to fund:
- the expansion of local Dementia Resource Centres and Community Groups that keep people free from isolation and connected to their community
- the charity’s 24-Hour Freephone Helpline (0808 808 3000) which operates 365 days per year providing information and support to anyone concerned about or living with dementia.
- And the charity’s network of local Dementia Advisors who provide vital support to people with dementia and their families throughout their time living with dementia.
Congratulations to all of Lower Third and class teacher, Ms Alison McPhee for their incredible work with this important charity.
You can read more about Kilgraston’s other fundraising and charity work here and find out more about we are educating our next generation of business leaders.
Fundraising by Kilgraston pupil
We are so proud of the latest fundraising by Kilgraston pupil, Lower Third’s Delilah.
She recently endured a night in sub zero temperatures, sleeping in a homemade igloo, and raised £1500 for Scotland’s Charity Air Ambulance (SCAA) in the process.
Deliliah’s adventures were reported in local newspaper, The Courier, where her mum Rosie said:
“She said it was the best night’s sleep she has ever had. I had to wake her up at 8.45am, two hours later than usual.
“I think there was a wind chill of -15 degrees C, but she says she was really cosy.
“We checked on her during the night. Staying on a farm, she’s camped out lots before.”
You can still help Delilah with her fundraising, her JustGiving page remains open and we hope she will continue to raise funds for her very worthy cause. https://www.justgiving.com/fundraising/delilahsigloo
Image: Kenny Smith
Kilgraston’s charity work continues
Kilgraston’s charity work is continuing and our most recent event was this year’s ‘Dress Up Day’.
This event, which raised over £270 for charity, was a great success, with the whole school dressing up as someone who inspired them, all the way from Marie Curie to The Incredibles.
The money raised will go to the charity Social Bite, a charity fighting homelessness and, due to the governments ‘UK Aid Match’, Kilgraston also raised money for ‘Mary’s Meals’ a charity that aids starving children in developing countries.
Kilgraston’s charity and community prefect, Katie Nicholson said “I thinks it’s amazing that Kilgraston is continuing efforts to provide support to those in need and bring our community together.”
The ‘Dress Up Day’ is the latest fundraising by Kilgraston and recently the school raised £277 for Macmillan Cancer Support.
Charity fundraising and charity ideas
Charity fundraising plays an important part to life at Kilgraston so we recently took part in the world’s biggest coffee morning, Macmillan Coffee Morning 2020. It sees people all over the UK host their own coffee morning, raising money for the charity which provides support and care for people living with cancer.
Of course, with COVID, this year’s event was slightly different. However it didn’t stop our charity fundraising efforts with the school raising £277.38 so a huge thank you to everyone who donated. A special thank you to Kilgraston’s catering team, Inspire, who donated hot chocolate and delicious cupcakes.
The event was organised by Kilgraston’s Community and Charity prefect, Upper Sixth’s, Katie who said: “Charity is a big part of Kilgraston and thanks to the help of many of my peers, Inspire Catering and everyone’s generous donations I believe Macmillan Coffee Morning was a huge success.
“Macmillan Cancer support is crucial during these times and I’m so happy that we were able to bring our Kilgraston community together for such a good cause.”
It is this year’s first charity fundraising event but it is an important subject to Katie and she hopes to have many more brilliant money-raising events.
Katie said: “Charity and Community has always been very important to me because it not only does it make a difference in our local community, but also worldwide.
“I’m really looking forward to being able to try and organise as many charity events as possible this year; fundraisers such as sponsored cycles and walks, bake sales and Home Clothes Days, not only do these help those in need but also brings our Kilgraston community together.
“I am working alongside Mr Allaker to once again be holding ‘SCIAF’ fundraisers later this term, such as the ‘Real Gifts’ at Christmas, which in previous years has been a massive success. ‘SCIAF’ is the Scottish Catholic International Aid Fund, they work in 26 countries across Asia, Africa and Latin America to help some of the poorest people in the world, regardless of religion, work their way out of poverty.
“The Kilgraston boarders are also participating in this years World Porridge day in October, an international fundraiser for Mary’s Meals to aid starving children in developing countries.
“In the local community our trips to Moncrieffe Care Home will be unfortunately be unable to go ahead this year, however the Junior School pupils are making some lovely cards which I’m sure will be greatly appreciated by all of the residents and staff. The annual Junior Years Harvest Festival will hopefully be able to go ahead again this year, where all of the food donations are given go to a local homeless shelter but also helps the junior girls to gain an increased value in the community.”
You can read more about Kilgraston’s charity fundraising and how important it is to the school here.