Welcome to Upper Canada District School Board Portal - Hundreds of UCDSB Staff and Students Honour The Memory of Terry Fox on National School Run Day

(Pictured above: Linklater Public School kindergarten teacher Gretchen Latchmore is pictured with students Machara Whitehead, 4, and Trent Swann 5, holding paper shoes students used to raise nearly $360 through the annual Purchase a Shoe Event. The fundraiser for the Terry Fox Foundation encouraged students to buy paper shoes for $1 and write on them the name of a loved one who had to cope with cancer. The week-long fundraiser was a lead-up to Friday's Terry Fox National School Run Day.)

(Brockville) - Hundreds of Upper Canada District School Board staff and students walked, skipped, jogged and ran for a Canadian hero Friday, generating nearly $21,000 during the 2009 Terry Fox National School Run Day.

Students and staff from across the Board marked the annual day, which serves to raise awareness about the impact of cancer on Canadian society, as well as to raise funds to find a cure through research.

Students such as Jessie Gaw of Linklater Public School walked a five-kilometer course along the Gananoque Trail with nearly 270 other students from Linklater.

Gaw raised $29 for the run to help people in Canada fighting cancer, he said.

“I’m walking because it will help with cancer research so maybe a life will be saved,” he said.

He added that he was inspired by Fox’s 1980 Marathon of Hope and wanted to honour his memory and the perseverance Fox demonstrated on his 5,400 kilometer journey in 1980.

“He is my hero because he really believed in what he was doing,” Gaw said. “Even when he was in terrible pain he kept going.”

Students at Linklater also chipped in with the Purchase a Shoe Event – buying coloured paper shoes on which they could write the name of a loved one whose life was touched by cancer. The shoes, which sold for $1 each, raised about $355 for the foundation and were displayed along the stairwell leading from the first to the second floor of the school.

Other UCDSB fundraising results from National School Run Day included: Carleton Place High School, $4,000; Char-Lan District High School, $3,393; East Front Public School, $500; Sweet’s Corners Elementary School, $210; Naismith Memorial Public School, $750; Lyn Public School, $400; Lombardy Public School, $600; Winchester Public School, $300; Gananoque Secondary School, $350; Kinsmen/Vincent Massey School, $77; Beckwith Public School, $386; Merrickville Public School and Wolford Public School, $500; Viscount Alexander Public School, $500; North Stormont Public School, $120; and Roxmore Public School, $400.

The day also saw the completion of the annual UCDSB Terry Fox Staff Challenge Relay, which ran from Monday to Friday. Staff members from across the UCDSB ran, walked, or jogged a combined total of 510 kilometers throughout the Board area as part of eastern and western relay teams. They began the relay in Kemptville, and finished at the Brockville Board office Friday afternoon.

“It was another successful relay to support Terry's dream,” said Superintendent Ted Kennedy, who organized the event.

Kennedy said the relay raised awareness about Terry Fox and his legacy, and helped with team building in the Board as squads from schools and administrative sites chipped in and participated.

(Pictured above: Corinne McCaffery, left, and Stacie Dowdall, two learning strategies consultants with the UCDSB, logged 7.7 kilometers as their contribution to the UCDSB Terry Fox Staff Challenge Relay.)