A group of ten Year 10 students (aged 14-15) from Archbishop Holgate’s School, York, are visiting the Diocese of Cape Town in South Africa for two weeks, leaving York on Friday 15th April.
The group will be led by teachers Richard Nihill and Hannah Turvey. Richard Nihill said, “this will be the sixth visit by a group from Archbishop Holgate’s, and the school has built up good relationships with individuals and organisations in Cape Town since 2004. The students will get a flavour of South Africa’s history and geography as well as getting to know the people, but the most important part of the visit is the community service the students will be doing. They’ll be doing some work with Fikelela, a charity for orphaned children with AIDS. They will be working in the AIDS orphanage in Khaylelitsha, which is home to children aged 6 months to 8 years, whose parents have died of AIDS, and who are themselves infected with the virus. They will also be working with The Warehouse, which works with homeless and destitute people. In particular they support people who have lost everything in devastating shack fires”.
In advance of their visit the students have been doing various fundraising events to contribute towards transport costs and to pay for the materials for the projects the group are going to be working on, as well as to support the general day to day work of the charities. They had a stall at Stamford Bridge School Fair, held an African themed fundraising lunch, have spent the day bag packing at Morrison’s supermarket and there has been a quiz night in the school. Collectively these events have raised over £1500.