There were nothing but smiles on Thursday for St. Mary's Catholic School inaugural Terry Fox and Community Courage Run, where every student at the school ran in honour of someone affected by cancer.

“We’ve always done the Terry Fox run and it’s been very important for our school because we’ve had a lot of families who’ve been affected by cancer,” said principal Mike Dufort.

Teachers Mrs. Ellis and Mrs. Godin said Fox, a humanitarian and cancer research activist, was the inspiration behind the Community Courage Run.

Every student from Kindergarten through Grade 8 was asked to bring in a toonie as a donation. 
Grade 4 student Karsten Neumann and his brother Axel went above and beyond, each bringing in $20.

The money raised by the students is being shared, with half going to the Terry Fox Foundation and the other half to families within the St. Mary’s community who are being affected by cancer.

“It’s a really great chance to bring everyone together and to recognize all of the people we have in our lives that are suffering from one situation or another,” said Dufort, adding that as a community it’s important to “always look out for others — and that’s what we’re trying to foster within the school.”

The youngest participants dashed around the perimeter of the school while the older students ran up to two kilometres, each wearing a colourful bib they had designed with the name of a person for whom they were running in honour of.

“The personal bibs of who they’re running for allows (the children) to make a personal connection,” said Dufort. “Instead of just talking about what it means to deal with a hardship and what Terry Fox taught us, this certainly takes it to the next level.”

The school has always participated in the Terry Fox run in the past, but Dufort said that through the new Community Courage run, the school wants to “also help out our local families.

“We recognize that we have a lot of families who have needs beyond cancer,” Dufort said. “If there is a way to make someone’s struggles a little bit easier through the money we’ve raised here, then we want to do that.”