Dónal Ring | Staff Writer
The premises for this year’s Relay for Life, an annual fundraising event held by Trinity Cancer Society, has been provided free of charge. Last year the society was charged significant amounts in order to pay staff in the sports centre, the event’s overnight venue.
Last year the main event took place on the Cricket Pitch outside the Pav. Relay is the College’s only 24-hour event, and thus an overnight area is thus needed to accommodate volunteers. Last year the College Sports Centre was used for this purpose, for which the society was charged over €1,000 for extra staffing. The overall funds raised amounted to just over €3,000, meaning a significant amount of the money was used to pay the extra expenses.
Dan McFadden, current President of Trinity Cancer Society, stated that while “the overall gains of the event outweighed any negatives” the costs incurred were “unfortunate”. The current Chair of Relay for Life Paul Meagher called the costs “excessive”.
This year the entire event, including the daytime track, will be held in Luce Hall, which College authorities are providing free of charge. Speaking to The University Times, Meagher attributed the move to the Provost’s public support of the proposal and to a motion passed at TCDSU council, saying: “I think it’s fair to say the pressure was on college to sort something out for us”. He expressed some annoyance at a delay in confirming the booking, stating: “they did leave an entire committee of students wondering whether or not we had permission for over two months as the exam office has first dibs”.
Relay for Life, now in its third year, starts at 12pm on Wednesday the 11th of March. Teams who enter are tasked with having at least one member walking on the track for the entire 24 hours, raising funds and participating in other activities during the day. Teams already lined up to participate include An Cumann Gaelach, S2S, Trinity VDP, and the Senior Freshman Science Class. Money raised by the event goes to the Irish Cancer Society.
The organisers say they are looking forward to the event. Speaking to The University Times, McFadden said: “It is set to be a wonderful coming together of the college community to fight back against a disease that affects the lives of so many”, while Meagher stated: “It is an incredibly upbeat event where we celebrate cancer survivors and we would love to invite everyone on campus to come and join in”. He added: “We have had a huge increase in team recruitment this year, which is down to Trojan work done by my co-chair Padraic Rowley. All in all I just can’t wait to get stuck into the 24 hours on Wednesday”.
Photo by Sinéad Baker for The University Times
