Staff set up to support charity

Staff at the Minster School, Southwell, channelled their competitiveness for Cancer Research UK.

The administration and learning support teams at the school took on the Walk All Over Cancer challenge to complete 10,000 steps every day in March.

They called themselves the Learning Support Striders and the Minster Movers.

Mrs Jo Woodhouse, of the Learning Support Striders, said: “The reason we are doing the fundraiser is twofold, firstly half of the TA team got Fitbits for Christmas and started to be competitive with each other on the number of steps they were doing and, secondly, two colleagues have been closely affected by cancer so we thought we should put that competitiveness to a good cause.”

Collectively the two groups are hoping to raise around £1,500.

The six members of the Minster Movers have so far clocked up an impressive 1,464,490 steps between them.

Two — Mrs Julie Naidu and Mrs Trish O’Malley — braved adverse weather to walk 68,966 steps between them, which is approximately 32½ miles.

Mrs O’Malley said: “The weather was awful, which really didn’t help. We both could have cried a few times but we made it and significantly added to our number of steps.”

Cancer Research UK funds more than 4,000 scientists, doctors and nurses across the UK and research into the disease.

Mrs Hayley Gault, of the Minster Movers, said: “It has been harder than we initially thought it would be but we all know we can step up to the challenge.”

Miss Lorraine Bailey, also of the Minster Movers, said: “We want to raise as much as we can and would like to thank everybody who has already donated.”

Both teams have a JustGiving page set up for donations at https://fundraise.cancerresearchuk.org/page/learaning-support-walks-all-over-cancer and https://fundraise.cancerresearchuk.org/team/minster-movers