Students and staff at Cobram’s Trikki Kidz Early Learning Centre have banded together to support one of their own.
On Friday, May 2, for a gold coin donation, dozens of students donned green clothing to support former classmate Benji Youd by raising money for the Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy Foundation.
“Benji’s been here since he was a baby, so he’s always been a part of our community,” supervisor Tamika Dyson said on the day.
“Victoria [Benji’s mum] put it out there that she was doing the Good Friday Appeal, and that was what opened it up for us to then ask if we could do something for it.”
Benji lives with Duchenne muscular dystrophy, a condition that causes the progressive atrophy of his muscles.
It’s only the latest in a collection of events run by the centre to support greater research into the condition.
“So we’ve got the Mother’s Day raffle, the Easter egg guess, the play-dough drive where we sold play-dough,” Ms Dyson said.
“Now we are also going to do an art show to sell the kids’ art.”
An Easter Raffle, held across the company’s three centres in Cobram, Barooga and Yarrawonga, also hauled in an impressive $2200 — all of which went to Benji’s Good Friday Appeal.
“We were rapt,” Ms Dyson said.
“We honestly didn’t think we’d get that much.”
With students from pre-school to kinder ages jumping on board the dress-up day, the centre quickly hit its target of raising $100 from gold coin donations.
Ms Dyson and fellow supervisor Jayne Allemand are yet to lock in a date for the art show, but hope to hold the event around the end of June.
Follow the Trikki Kidz Early Learning Group’s Facebook page at tinyurl.com/2nmjvvp4 for updates.