Three Strokestown Transition Year (TY) students who restored a 1956 Ferguson 20 tractor and are raffling it to raise money for Childhood Cancer Foundation Ireland, are delighted with the take off of their campaign following their appearance on RTE’s Nationwide last week.

Andrew Jordan, Jack Beirne and Mark Rogers from Scoil Mhuire in Strokestown were featured on the programme and sold 1,800 raffle tickets for the 1956 model immediately after the broadcast. Andrew said the boys and their school have been blown away by the support for the fundraising campaign.

From the moment we launched this campaign at the start of the month we had amazing support from our local communities and we had sold 1,500 tickets before Nationwide aired.

“We were delighted to be featured on the programme because we knew it would improve ticket sales and we want to make as much as we can for Childhood Cancer Foundation Ireland to support the great work they do with families around the country. We would like to thank everyone who has donated so far.”

Childhood cancer survivor

The boys restored the 1956 Ferguson 20 as part of their TY enterprise project which encourages students to develop their own business idea, preparing business plans and creating products or running events with a view to making a profit. In this case, the boys have decided to donate any profits made to a charity that is special to them.

Their teammate Jack is a childhood cancer survivor and has worked as an ambassador with the charity for a number of years.

“I was diagnosed with acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) when I was three and my family spent three-and-a half years bringing me up and down to Crumlin for chemotherapy.

I am one of the lucky ones, I am now cancer-free and have been discharged from all medical services for the last few years. I continued to work with Childhood Cancer Foundation Ireland because I know how important their supports are for children and their families at such a difficult time in their lives.

Laura Cullinan, a voluntary director with Childhood Cancer Foundation Ireland and a parent of a child who has also survived childhood cancer, said: “We have been so inspired by the boys since they contacted us about this project. The aim of the enterprise project is to create a profit-making business idea and they could easily have decided to keep any profit for themselves.

“But they have gone above and beyond what was expected to them to raise money for charity and they are doing so well. This has been an incredibly difficult year for all charities, as normal events and fundraising campaigns had to be cancelled or postponed due to Covid, so these funds make a huge difference to our work.”

One lucky winner

One lucky winner will drive away with the transformed 1956 Ferguson 20 on January 8. People can enter the raffle for the 1956 gem on Facebook at Classic4KidsCancer. 100% of the profits from the sale of the tickets will be donated to Childhood Cancer Foundation Ireland.