About Me
Hi everyone! My name is Marco. I am in Year 12, and I study Biology, Chemistry, Maths, and Further Maths. I have always found medicine to be a fascinating and appealing career, and I plan on applying to medical school this October.
Together with the biochemistry society I run at school, we decided to take part in the winter fundraiser challenge, proudly raising over £200 for the RMBF!
Photo of myself and Katie, who runs the biochemistry society with me.
Why I Chose to Fundraise
I was introduced to the winter challenge during a meeting with Medic Mentor. When I heard about it, I told everyone in the biochemistry society, and they all seemed very interested in taking part.
As future doctors, many of us in the society felt that by participating in fundraising activities for a charity that supports medical students, we could make an impact in the world of healthcare even before starting to practice medicine. What an incredible contribution to make!
My Fundraising Activity
With the help of many members participating in the fundraiser, we brainstormed ideas for the event. We considered a few options: a non-uniform day (which our school kindly offered to support), a sponsored run (despite the cold, wintry weather), or even a bake sale at a local football pitch.
All of these ideas seemed quite difficult to run without too much hassle, and we were unsure which one to proceed with.
That was until one of our team members, Chanel, came to us with the idea of hosting a ‘Candy Gram’ in school—like the one featured in the hit 2000s movie ‘Mean Girls’. It seemed easy enough to coordinate and was something we thought many students in our school would be interested in. With the gram, students could pay 50 pence to buy a candy cane for another person in school and attach a personalised message to it.
With the help of Katie (who runs the biochemistry society with me), who designed posters to put up around school, we launched a strong advertising campaign weeks before the fundraiser began. Then, we set up our stall during lunchtimes, allowing students and teachers to purchase candy canes.
Luckily, our idea was a hit! In just three days of running our stall, we had sold over 400 candy canes to students and teachers. Once we had finalized the exact number of orders, we had just under a week to pack and prepare all of the candy canes for distribution the following week.
Chanel and I took on the task of packing all of the candy canes that week. Having divided the workload somewhat equally (although, if I’m being fair, Chanel definitely took on more candy canes than I), we began the process of assembling the large number of candy canes.
Thankfully, my artistic skills and creativity were not tested too much during the packing process—Chanel taught me how to neatly pack the candy canes, creating the beautiful design you can see below! (If the design process had been left up to me, I doubt it would have been as successful!)
The general design of the candy canes, with the two flavours we sold – strawberry and peppermint
After a long weekend of going through each individual order, we returned to school the next week and distributed all of the candy canes to form groups across our school.
We managed to raise just over £200 in profit from our Candy Gram, and although the stock of candy canes in local shops may have temporarily plummeted due to our compulsive purchasing, it is safe to say that Chanel’s idea was a success!
The state of my room on the last day of candy cane packing!
What I Enjoyed
Being able to work as a team with everyone in the biochemistry society was an incredibly enjoyable experience. Although I have only explicitly mentioned Katie, Chanel, and myself in this post, it is important to acknowledge that all 13 members of the society who took part in the fundraiser played huge roles in making it a success. Two different students managed the stall each lunchtime (both KS3 and KS4), and the design of the candy cane tags was created by a Year 13 member of the society.
Furthermore, being able to spread Christmas cheer in a charitable way made the whole experience even more rewarding.
Knowing that our hard work meant that doctors, medical students, and their families facing a difficult winter could receive the help they needed truly added so much more value to the entire project.
If you are considering a fundraiser – don’t hesitate! I’d be lying if I said that we went into our idea with absolute confidence, we were unsure of how we would handle everything, or if our idea would even resonate with other students in our school. However, it was an invaluable experience and a wonderful thing to talk about when October comes and it is time to apply to medical school!
Thank you to Marco, Katie, Chanel and the Biochemistry society for your incredible fundraising through such a creative idea! You’re making a real difference to doctors and medical students.
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