The team
Congratulations to the St Joan of Arc Road to Rouen Team who returned to the school in Rickmansworth at 3pm yesterday (Monday 15th October 2012) to a waiting school community ready to welcome and congratulate them on their achievements. The Road to Rouen Challenge started at St Joan of Arc Catholic School, Rickmansworth on Friday 12th October at 9am when a team of five staff and two parents set off for Rouen in France. The round trip of 250 miles took the team four days to complete.
Over the course of the four days the team pushed their bodies to the limit while averaging speeds of 15mph, taking falls, suffering tyre punctures and broken chains along the way. This was done all in the cause of the school’s charity, Udayan, a home, school and medical unit for children of leprosy sufferers in Calcutta, India. The team have so far raised an amazing £7,000 for Udayan with still more money promised.
The team’s arrival at St Joan of Arc
Speaking after the welcoming reception Liam Lynch, School Chaplin, said:
“Thank you for such a reception. What we as a community have achieved is amazing. Before we have supported Udayan in many ways including buying bunk beds for the kids to sleep on, sending teachers to teach English and stocking their library with books. But this time we’ve done it differently. In the past when we’ve raised money it’s been for something specific or to help some of our students go out to visit. This time we will be simply putting a cheque of around £8000 into the hands of James, who founded the centre, to use however it may help the children best!”
The school community congratulating the returning team
The team leaving St Joan of Arc for Rouen
Today, a team consisting of 5 school staff including the Head Teacher and Chaplin, and 2 parents set off on the huge challenge of cycling to Rouen, France, from the school in Rickmansworth, Hertfordshire and back to show that freedom is worth fighting for. The freedom that this team are undertaking the challenge for is the belief that all children should have the opportunities that are available to children in this country: education, shelter, health care, and most importantly a childhood.
St Joan of Arc Catholic School has a growing bond with Udayan, a centre in Calcutta, India that over 300 children call home. All of these children are the children of leprosy sufferers, some have the disease themselves, and as such would miss having many of the opportunities that every child deserves. Since March 2004, St Joan’s have held many fund raising events with the aim of supporting Udayan, and of spreading awareness in the local community about the work they carry out for the children of leprosy sufferers in Calcutta, India.
The riders are Mr Sweeney (Head Teacher), Liam Lynch (Chaplain), Mr McGlaughlin (English), Mr Simpson (PE), Mr Walsh (Maths), Mr D’Urso (Parent) & Mr Reilly (Parent). They are supported by Mr Knapton (Site Services) and Miss Devlin (Head of 6th Form) in the team bus. Their challenge will take 4 days and cover 250 miles.
All of these riders were cycling novices when they took up the challenge, some didn’t even have a bike to use – one is still borrowing a friend’s! The training has been gruelling and several of this final team were drafted in to replace others who have had to retire with training injuries.
On leaving Rickmansworth the team stopped by St John’s Primary School to receive a sensational farewell from the pupils who lined both sides of the driveway as the team set off for Portsmouth. Next Friday St John’s will be fundraising themselves for Udayan with a sponsored walk, Years 1 – 5 will be walking a mile each, and the Year 6 pupils will be walking two miles. This amounts to 250 miles walked in total by the children of St John’s to match the distance the team will be cycling to Rouen. In addition, during lunch breaks next week the staff will be participating in a sponsored cycle (on exercise bikes) in the dining area at lunch times! Once again we thank St John’s for their continued support of the Udayan children.
A quick stop at St John’s Primary School on their way to Rouen
On behalf of the staff, children and friends of Udayan we wish the team the very best of luck for a successful journey and thank them for their fundraising efforts. To those who have supported the team by donating, thank you for your generosity. If you haven’t donated already and would like to, you can do so through JustGiving where UK tax payers can GiftAid their donation as well, meaning Udayan will receive the tax relief worth an addition 25% of your donation. To donate, click here.
You can follow the teams progress on a website they have created by clicking here.
The Team’s Kit
A five-man cycle team including Liam the chaplain and Mr Sweeney are setting out on a 4-day 240 mile charity ride to Rouen in France. They will set off from St Joan’s on Friday 12 October and return on the Monday. All the raised sponsorship is for the children of Udayan. Donations can be made online and further information found by following the link at https://www.justgiving.com/teams/Road2Rouen.
Further information can be found on St Joan of Arc’s website by clicking here.
A video from the children of Udayan
On the morning of 13th August 2009 I sat at Gatwick Airport feeling rather forlorn, tears pricking at my eyes, feeling guilty at leaving my husband and children for 3 weeks to travel over 5,000 miles to Udayan; it would be the first time in my life that I had ventured out of Europe.
However, the following day, after a wonderful journey, a very warm welcome, and an enlightening tour of the well-oiled machine that is Udayan, a hive of purposeful activity from morning till night, I was filled with enthusiasm and couldn’t wait to start teaching!
All the children learn English but it is taught in a very literary style, so they can read and write it well but experience difficulty when speaking it. I had been thoroughly briefed before my departure about the difficulties in grammar, word order and pronunciation experienced by speakers of Bengali and Hindi when learning to speak English so I had prepared appropriate resources and activities, but it hadn’t occurred to me that some of my teaching methods might prove confusing for the students who are used to repeating, reciting and learning by heart!
Nonetheless, initial struggles in all classes were soon overcome as the children became used to techniques such as pair work, question and answer chains, catching a ball while having to respond to a question and conducting simple conversational dialogues. With the older students we graduated to conversations about future aspirations with reasons for their preferences. Soon, outside classes, children started asking me about myself and my family. Each day more of them would pluck up the courage to come for a chat; cricket and food were popular topics, too.
I included singing and rhymes in all the lessons. The little ones loved singing ‘Tommy Thumb’ at the top of their voices with all the actions. Everybody liked singing the days of the week to the tune of ‘Camptown Races’ and with older students we often used to finish off lessons with a hearty rendering of ‘Old MacDonald had a Farm’ including a variety of loud animal noises! Many knew some English songs already so we would often have a singsong as we walked to and from lessons and mealtimes, too.
We played memory games involving past events; the older girls loved doing this, showing skill, imagination and humour. We also worked on giving descriptions using pronouns and adjectives. With younger students I used various stories to achieve this: Eric Carle’s ‘The Very Hungry Caterpillar’ was a great favourite. Older students rose to the challenge of playing guessing games which developed their descriptive vocabulary and made us laugh, too. On my last day at Udayan the class IX boys aged 14-15 invented their own descriptions of all manner of things for me to guess as well as quizzing me thoroughly. I was delighted with their progress.
The primary teachers who work at Udayan are committed to continuing with spoken English as part of their teaching and for the older students who are at high schools off site it is hoped that a teacher will be found to continue the practice of English conversation lessons at Udayan. If the children can learn to speak good English it will improve their chances of getting a job and being able to elevate their families, who are all affected to varying degrees by leprosy and other problems such as TB, out of poverty.
The caring kindness and support I received during my stay was incredible, my family were delighted to see me glowing with health on my return! I was so well looked after and it was a luxury indeed to have delicious meals cooked for me daily! I quickly got used to rising early and starting work after a lovely cup of sweet black tea and two biscuits at 6.45 as well as eating hot spicy food for breakfast after my first hour’s lesson each morning. I also got used to the great heat and the sudden bouts of rainfall; the snakes, frogs, lizards and big, beautiful dragonflies.
I think about the students and staff of Udayan each day and look at their pictures. I miss hearing the chorus of ‘Good morning, Auntie’ when I rise and ‘Good night, Auntie’ when I go to bed. My overriding memories are of smiles and laughter yet the children possess next to nothing in material terms and the staff work long hours for very modest wages. They also cope with frequent power cuts which mean the water has to be pumped by hand and the fans stop working, so in August with temperatures in the thirties and forties centigrade and not much of a drop at night, life becomes quite a trial! However everyone takes these problems in their stride and nothing stops them from functioning as a community.
The support we give to Udayan, both through Mrs Weldon’s tireless fundraising and her awareness raising projects, is incredibly important. James Stevens, the wonderful man who founded the centre forty years ago, has expanded the capacity of Udayan so that more and more children can benefit from the structure and education it provides and our contributions are increasingly valuable as help from other sources recedes.
I do hope the entire Community of St Joan’s will continue to support Udayan with generosity; it truly is a most worthy and inspiring cause which gives children who start life with meagre prospects health, education and a future to which they can look forward with hope.
Mrs Schramm, October 2009
Following on from the assembly given to St John’s Catholic primary school in Rickmansworth by a group of the St Joan of Arc sixth form students who visited Udayan earlier in the year, the children were inspired to raise money by doing various sponsored events during their sports week in the summer term.
The Udayan Fundraising Committee would like to thank one of our benefactors, Shahab Uddin, who along with his three brothers runs Rasal Brasserie in Rickmansworth High Street. He very generously provided a wonderful dinner for A Flavour of India 2. The meal was supplied at no cost, thus allowing all the money raised at the event, held on Saturday 15th September 2007, to be sent to Udayan. When Shahab’s kindness became known by those present, there was a spontaneous applause.
The two groups who have been to Udayan have both had celebration meals at Shahab’s restaurant and have nothing but praise for the quality of the cuisine, the friendly and efficient service, and the authentic atmosphere.
Rasal Brasserier
173A High St
Rickmansworth
WD3 1AY
Telephone: 01923 778722
Website: www.rasalbrasserie.co.uk