Fundraising and Charity

e actively encourage all our students, from the youngest age, to get involved in fundraising activities for their choice of local, national and international charities. 

Our girls and boys (and parents!) are enthusiastic participants who get involved, bringing energy and a 'can-do' attitude to all their charitable endeavors. 

 

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Restless Triathlon

Sunday’s Restless Triathlon was an enormous success with over 800 participants raising nearly £90,000. It was brilliant to see so many young people, especially Russellians, working hard to raise money for this great initiative. The rain and mud added a sense of accomplishment to all those who crossed the line, weary but happy

Vanguard Way 2023 Logo

 

 
 

Vanguard Way Challenge

The Vanguard Challenge is a 66 mile path from Newhaven to East Croydon, which was organised by the School 10 years ago to raise money for charity. This year, we are doing it again for six different charities on Sunday 25 June.

Click here for more information. 

 

 

Christmas spirit at the Foodbank

In December, our students and staff came together to donate food and toiletries to the Croydon Foodbank.

This annual collection allows Royal Russell to help the Croydon community, and to ensure that everyone has food on the table at Christmas. A special mention must go to Zamanbek (Oxford, Year 13), who organised a collection in Oxford House and donated an amazing amount of food.

Many thanks to all who donated this year.

Students Charity Project for the BTP Officer Injured in the London Terror Attacks

Grace, Eddie, Saffron and Samuel decided to take on an individual challenge to raise money for the brave British Transport Police officer who risked his life to save innocent people in the terrible London Bridge attack and was seriously injured.

They wanted to find a way to say ‘thank you’. Samuel’s challenge was to bake as much as he could and organise a cake sale. And what a  triumph! Brownies, cookies, cup cakes… you name it… and he even got up at 5am to finish the icing.  The team all worked together, the pupils were queuing round the block and then coming back for seconds, until he completely sold out! An amazing £191.80 was raised.

PC Gallagher, who works with the brave BTP officer, PC Wayne Marques, is coming into School next week to accept all the donations on his behalf.  If you would still like to contribute to this, please do feel free to contact any of the students or Mrs Pepperdine. You can still donate to Eddie’s Justgiving page, where any money raised will go directly to Wayne to help with his recovery and remind him how grateful we are for all he did.

 

Race For Life

On Sunday the 25th of June, girls from Buchanan and Hollenden took part in a 5k race to achieve as much money as they could in order to raise money for the race for life organisation. As the event colour theme was hot pink, most of us decided to wear bright pink, with big bows and even tutus.

We arrived in Epsom around 10:00 and headed over to the stage where we warmed up by dancing with a dance instructor and learnt about cancer and people who have suffered and tried to fight it. When it was about to turn 11:00 we headed over to our groups either runners, walkers or joggers and stayed with our group through the run.

The track was quite sandy and steep and hard to run on, but luckily we had our favourite teachers to support or even run with us.  We all want to say a huge thank you to Mrs. Baldwin, Mrs Corcoran, Mrs Culbert, Miss Calvet, Mrs Colyer, Miss Campbell, Mrs Hinson, Mrs Missan, Mrs Pepperdine and last but not least Mrs.Hadjan who came 1st in Epsom out of all the 10k runners!

We also want to say congratulations to the girls from Royal Russell who ran in Year 7: Caitlin, Lily, Hannah, Tehmeena, Katie, Georgia and Carey and from year 8: Michaela and Emily.

So far, staff and students have raised around £1300, and we want to thank all the people who helped us along the way. We hope we can beat cancer one day, or help as many people as we can.

 

 

London Marathon Success

Junior School Sports Coach Graham Swann ran his 34th London Marathon on Sunday in aid of Demelza Hospice Care for Children. 

He completed the course in 5 hours and 11 minutes and raised an amazing £518.00.

Well done Graham.

Restless Development

CONGRATULATIONS!! To all out triathletes who swam, biked and ran brilliantly raising huge amounts of money for Restless Development. At the last count the weekends event total was over £46,000. WOW! Keep the money coming in. It was great to see the fantastic team spirit apparent, the happy faces and excitement for everyone. A triathlon is a huge challenge and you should be very proud of what you achieved. WELL DONE!

World Book Day

This year, the Library held its annual book sale to celebrate World Book Day to raise funds for “Living Paintings”. 

The charity, the only one of its kind in the UK, design, create and publish tactile and audio books for blind and partially sighted people. The books are known as “Touch to See” books and are distributed through their free postal library. The charity produces titles suitable for all ages, from pre-school to adult.

Lots of parents, staff and pupils donated books and DVDs for the sale and a flurry of customers throughout the whole of the lunch break meant that we have raised approximately £120! Thank you to all who came and supported the sale.

Quiz Night Raffle

The raffle held at our annual Parents' Association Quiz Night raised over £500.00 for the Motor Neurone Disease Association, in support of our dear friend Graham Clark. 

Salvation Army Christmas Appeal

Our Junior School supported the Salvation Army again this year by donating two car loads toys and games. 

The Salvation Arrmy helped give toys and food to local children, who would otherwise not receive anything for Christmas. They also provided the children with gifts they could give to their parents.

Croydon Tram Tragedy

Following the tragic tram derailment at Sandilands, Croydon, donations at events and a mufti day raised £701.00 for Croydon Tram Victim Support to support those who lost family members and friends.

Poppy Appeal

Royal Russell raised an amazing £1.353.73 selling poppies for the Poppy Appeal. 

 

Staff and students raised this fantastic amount for the Royal British Legion enabling them to help current and ex-Armed Forces personnel and their families.

Shelter

Oxford House held a special Chapel service. The theme was 'Shelter at 50'. 50 years of the charity which supports the homeless and campaigns against inadequate housing conditions.

There were various presentations by different year groups, including a Year 13 video in the style of MTV cribs.

Over £250 was raised for Shelter.

Marie Curie Cancer Care

Pupils. staff and parents alike have had fun whilst we raised money for Marie Curie Cancer Care.

Buchanan Cupcakes

Buchanan’s Chapel service last week was all about how love and kindness can see you through the darkest times. 

To celebrate the power of friendship and support, as well as to raise money for two charities close to Buchanan’s hearts, we iced and decorated 200 cupcakes. Students and staff throughout the school community have been buying and receiving vouchers, letting them know someone cares, which they exchanged for one of these delicious creations!  

A huge thank you to all those involved. Not only did we have a lot of fun, enjoyed some sugar rushes from the obligatory bowl ‘cleaning’, we raised over £200 for Reverse Rett and Cystic Fibrosis Trust

 

Mufti Day for Place2Be

The Junior and Senior School has been spreading a little kindness this week and held a Mufti Day on Friday in support of children's mental health charity Place2be.

The total raised by the Junior and Senior School was an amazing £1,136

Movember

Well done to the nine Sixth Form students who grew moustaches for the charity event Movember: Farhoud Pishnamazi, Zachary Dhanoo, Skanda Subramani, Raffael Ryder, David Gordon-Dixon, Aidan Muldoon, George Lee, Uzair Ajmi, and Timothy Moro.

An impressive grand total of £901.20 was raised, which along with the monies raised by Junior School staff gave a total of nearly £1900.00

Amy Flavin from Orchid Cancer collected our cheque and presented the boys with a certificate.

Waggy Tails

Local charity Waggy Tails, along with dogs Teddy and Rosie, told Year 9 pupils of the opportunities to volunteer.

Waggy Tails is a dog activity club in South Croydon created to give young people aged 13-18 with special needs/disabilities the opportunity to work and train dogs in a monitored environment.
The club aims to help every child receive a sense of worth/value, fun and fulfillment, with the opportunity to meet and make new like-minded friends.

The Girls of Hollenden, Buchanan and Reade House ‘Race for Life’

It was ten o’clock and the build-up of pink around the stage made the atmosphere exciting.  We, the bunch of all-sorts: ready to run to beat cancer.  As the loud music bounced and the crazy lady jumped, the downpour of rain drenched our every item of clothing.  The thought of running through this made me cringe, but we weren’t running for ‘no one’. Deep down, each one of us held a memory of a  cancer friend or family member.

As the race started, the group were split into two: the runners and the walkers.  However there were a few in between ….continuous running for 5k was hard! While running, it seemed like every km we finished, the heavier the rain and the thicker the mud, it was like a battle, pink women against Mother Nature. As the number of people watching and cheering increased, we started sprinting and the finishing line came in reach.  Don’t trip.  Don’t fall.  Don’t do anything embarrassing! When one foot was over the finish line,  I felt relieved and proud. For my friends and for me.  I wanted to do it again, however maybe in better weather. 

Croydon Foodbank

Students, staff and parents have contributed an incredible amount food, toiletries and other goodies to support those less fortunate than ourselves at the Croydon Foodbank.

The response to our appeal has been amazing, and Mrs Hart and Miss Wood would like to thank everybody who has got involved. As representatives for the Student Council, Polina and Peter, Year 12, came with us to the Foodbank to deliver our donation. It was a very moving moment in which you could really see how our donations will be used.