Julie's campaign for FRIENDS OF WALTON HALL

Hi! My name is Julie Wood and I am the Principal of Walton Hall Academy, a school for children with special educational needs and disabilities aged 11-19 in Staffordshire. We have 168 students on role with a vast range of needs. The Friends of Walton Hall Charity group work hard to raise funds for big projects that will improve the education and experience that our students have at school. Our normal school funds would not be able to stretch to paying for these projects, but the benefit of them is significant for our young people. 

As an expanding school, we need to generate more classroom space for our young people and increase our facilities that would enable all students to reach their potential. We also need to purchase more sensory equipment, for use both indoors and outdoors that would enable our learners to sensory regulate and have a more positive learning experience. 

The staff group that run this charity work extremely hard and I am very grateful for what they do. I want to show this by supporting them to raise more funds by setting myself a challenge. My first term as Principal has certainly come with many challenges as we have navigated the staff and students through the COVID pandemic. I want to start the new year off in a positive way and do something that will not only help me, but also help all of the wonderful students and staff that I have the pleasure of spending my days with. I have not had time for exercise in a good while, so this challenge for me is going to be extremely tough, however the cause is very much worth it. I am challenging myself to run over 50 miles in the month of January. It would be great if you could support me and improve the experience the wonderful students at Walton Hall Academy are able to gain.