New path opens up at primary school
A new path has opened at a Perthshire primary school thanks to a community fundraising effort.
Children at St Madoes Primary School have been taking part in the ‘daily mile’ initiative for the past three years, which sees the children running or jogging for 15 minutes every day.
The daily mile has proved popular with the school children, however in poorer weather conditions it can be difficult for them to complete their run.
That was when head teacher Jenny Campbell suggested opening up a path at the school, which would allow the children to go out for their daily mile in all weather conditions.
Teresa Strachan, secretary of St Madoes Primary School Parent Council, said: “The children of St Madoes Primary School have been taking part in the Daily Mile initiative since 2016.
“The daily mile is a fully inclusive, free and simple initiative which improves the physical and mental health of children.
“It’s a social activity where the children run or jog, at their own pace, for 15 minutes every day.
“Some class teachers use the daily mile to reinforce social and learning skills with one class recently being asked to shake hands and introduce themselves in French to their classmates as they passed each other on the route.
“The class teachers noted how much of a positive effect getting outside and this year she will get to do just that, so she is really happy.
“Lily is getting a VIP pass to sit at the side of the stage and see all the acts as well.”
Jane says it is opportunities like this that help her and little Lily get through the hard times of battling cancer.
She continued: “Everyone has been so kind to us with everything they do for Lily.
“Things like this keep you going between chemo and the hard times.
“At the moment we are waiting on scans and we don’t know what the next steps are, and something like this takes your mind off it all and lets you forget about all the bad stuff for a day or two.
“This will get us into the Christmas spirit.
“It can be a difficult time of year completing the daily mile had on the children, however due to the playground consisting mainly of grass, they were only able to get outside when the weather was dry.
“Head teacher Jenny Campbell approached the parent council with the idea of having a path installed which would allow the children to complete their daily mile every day regardless of weather.
“The parent council was able to part fund the project and was successful in securing funding from Perth and Kinross Council’s community investment fund with West Carse Community Council kindly providing the remainder of the funding from their solar panel community benefit fund.” because you worry this will be the last one - so we like to go all out every year.
“We go to as many pantos as we can and start the celebrations really early we will probably end up putting up the Christmas tree after the lights switchon.”
The decision comes after local businessman Pete Chan rallied hundreds of people to call on Perth and Kinross Council to get the youngster up on stage for the event.
Last week a spokesperson for the council said: “Provost Dennis Melloy has spoken with the Douglas family and is happy to confirm that Lily Douglas will join him in celebrating Perth’s Christmas lights event on November 16.”
Jane said she hopes this will kick-start a tradition of having a local hero on stage to turn on Perth’s Christmas lights.
She said: “Hopefully next year they will get a local hero up on stage - even someone who is older, it doesn’t have to be a child.
“It would be fantastic if other people could get up on stage in years to come and start something really good for local people.”
A start-studded line-up was announced last week for the Christmas lights switch-on on Saturday, November 16, including Atomic Kitten, Dario G, Alice Deejay and NTrance.