A group of Year 5 students at St Margaret’s Anglican Girls School have made a touching contribution towards the fight against Coronavirus.
The girls, feeling compelled to make a difference during the global Coronavirus crisis, hatched a plan to fundraise for COVID-19 research by holding a family movie night.
Imogen Wren, one of the masterminds behind the idea said: “We wanted to do something for the planet and we realised the perfect thing would be Coronavirus research. We needed to know whether any funds we raised would be helpful or not so we decided to write a letter.”
Imogen penned a letter to Dr Paul Young, lead researcher at The University of Queensland (UQ), sharing their plans.
Their letter prompted an encouraging response in which Dr Young wrote: “It was extremely touching and humbling to receive your kind letter when I had a brief moment to step out of the laboratory today to check my e-mail.
“The whole team here are working really hard to deliver on this program, and your kind thoughts and donation mean more to us than pretty much anything else that has crossed our desks since we began this journey in early January. It will undoubtedly keep us strong.
“I find it inspiring when young people, such as yourselves, harness the power of philanthropy to solve the world’s greatest problems,” he wrote.
Imogen was moved and humbled by Dr Young’s response and said, “I felt like I was really doing something important.”
With the government’s new measures for social distancing in place, the family movie night will not be going ahead at this stage but the girls are planning alternative fundraising ideas to help reach their philanthropic goal.