Athletics legend Steve Cram and BBC Look North presenter Jeff Brown have joined a team of fundraisers to complete a 200-mile cycling challenge in aid of a vital project at a primary school in Kenya. Along with eight other riders, Steve and Jeff helped raise over £25,000 for North East based international children’s charity COCO (Comrades of Children Overseas). Money from the cycle challenge will be added to the Save Mercy Primary Appeal, which was launched by COCO last month with the aim of raising over £40,000 to build five urgently needed classrooms at the school.
Steve Cram and Jeff Brown both committed to take part in the COCO Victoria Cycle Challenge at the start of the year, joining some of the charity’s other supporters to ride across Kenya and raise money to support work to boost educational opportunities for young people in East Africa. During the ride, the group has covered diverse landscapes and climbed a total height of 3,640m in the Kenyan heat. All of the cyclists were kitted out with performance apparel from Presca Teamwear, a growing North East based brand of ethically sourced, sustainable sports products.
The ride concluded with a visit to one of COCO’s Schools for Life projects, Mercy Primary. This was always the plan, but the timing has proved to be crucial. The school recently and unexpectedly had to pull down some temporary classrooms that were awaiting replacement and now urgently needs to raise £42,500 to build five permanent classrooms, giving students access to the education that is essential for improving their future prospects. Money raised by Steve, Jeff and their fellow cyclists will contribute to the Save Mercy Primary Appeal, helping the campaign get much closer to its target.
Steve Cram, co-founder of COCO, comments: “Mercy Primary School does an amazing job of providing education to young people and COCO has been working closely with the team there for years. We always wanted to show off the school to supporters during the Victoria Cycle Challenge, as a great example of how our work makes a big difference at a local level. These unexpected recent developments made it even more vital that we raised as much money as possible during the ride, and the importance of this was really brought home to all of us during our visit to the school.”
Jeff Brown adds: “The ride has been a brilliant, if challenging, experience. Finishing our challenge at Mercy Primary was perfect, as we were able to meet some of the wonderful young people who will benefit from the money that we have been raising. It was a privilege to chat with them and their teachers about the school and its role in the community. I now have a much better appreciation of the direct local impact of the work of COCO, and that motivates me even more to support campaigns like Save Mercy Primary.”
The Save Mercy Primary Appeal remains open for donations at www.coco.org.uk/classrooms. In addition, donations can be made by text message. Text ‘SCHOOL’ to 70470 to donate £5. Texts costs £5 plus the standard message rate. People can also donate £20 by texting ‘SCHOOL 20’ to 70470, where the text will cost £20 plus the standard message rate.
Co-founded in 2000 by Steve Cram CBE and British Army Major Jim Panton, COCO has grown into one of the North East’s most dynamic and well-loved charities, working in partnership with remote communities across East Africa to provide access to the quality education that is essential for a good start in life. Since its inception, the charity has raised over £4.5 million to fund small, community led programmes. COCO and its partners have now undertaken 66 transformational projects in 16 countries, positively impacting on the lives of over 200,000 people.
For further information about the work of COCO, visit www.coco.org.uk, find the charity on Facebook, or follow @COCO_Charity on Twitter.