A student from St. Anne’s French Immersion School holds up a penny like those collected by her classmates since 2008 in support of UWindsor breast cancer research.
The students of St. Anne’s French Immersion School are an inspiring group, says Gemma Grey-Hall.
Major gift officer for the Faculty of Science, she says she was honoured to be able to take delivery of their donation of more than $2,500 in support of the Carl and Gloria Morgan Graduate Scholarship in Breast Cancer Research, during an assembly at the school Tuesday.
“They had so much enthusiasm for this cause,” Grey-Hall said. “It was very moving to see the effort they put into the project.”
The school started a penny drive in 2008 which has grown into an annual campaign collecting for the scholarship. In seven years, students and their families have raised a total of almost $25,000 including government matching funds.
This year’s campaign included a button design competition, which saw four selected finalists sell for $2 apiece. Grey-Hall said the budding artists took great pride in their creations.
“The buttons looked so fantastic,” she said. “The amount of work that went into them was obvious.”
Scholarship recipient Martin Crozier, a master’s student in the lab of biology professor Lisa Porter, was on hand for Tuesday’s cheque presentation. His research focuses on the role of the stress hormone cortisol in breast cancer initiation and progression.