Pupils pedal to put African girls through school
Pupils at a village school have got on their bikes in a sponsored cycle to help educate a pair of children in Africa.
For the past two years Welbourn Primary School has sponsored Brizy and Mercy to go to school in Uganda.
As well as receiving an education, the funds allow for them to have hot meals and uniform through the Step Up organisation.
Teacher Andrea Bonsall explained: “The school council have held two fun runs in the past two years to raise funds to sponsor them, raising almost £2,000.”
This year, they held a sponsored bike event, with four bikes of varying sizes, set up on indoor bike trainers, positioned under the canopy outside their classroom.
Andrea said the aim was to combine the total of cycled hours to add up to 18 hours, which is the time it would take to fly to Uganda and back from Welbourn.
The children, from all year groups, cycled all day on November 7, swapping over every five minutes to keep the bike going.
New headteacher Anna Ingamells said £500 raised would educate the two children for a year, but by raising even more, they hope to be able to purchase the two girls a bike each.
She said: “We get regular updates from the two girls to show the pupils who want to know how well they are doing.
"Staff did the biking in the lunch hour and breaks too.”
She wanted to thank Sleaford Wheelers and Mark Hume Cycle Services of Ancaster for supporting their efforts by supplying the static cycle trainers.