SPORTY students at a North Yorkshire school raised a massive £15,000 by taking part in this year’s Great North Run.

In all 24 girls and four members of staff at the private Queen Margaret’s School, in Escrick, took part in the country’s biggest half marathon in aid of Great Ormond Street Hospital, the Cystic Fibrosis Trust and Children With Leukaemia.

Last year, the school raised £3,000 through taking part in the run, so this year’s total smashes that.

PE teacher Fiona Whittle said the girls’ efforts to raise the cash had been fabulous.

She said “The girls chose the charities they felt strongly about, but there is a connection with one of the charities as one girl’s sister was treated at Great Ormond Street.”

Miss Whittle said it was the third year that students from the school had completed the run and she was amazed by the girls’ commitment. She said: “I expected more of them to drop out but they were just fabulous.”

She said the quickest of the school’s runners was Suzie Braithwaite, who is in the upper sixth, and completed the course in a time of one hour 50 minutess.

But Miss Whittle said: “We were really, really impressed with all their times.

“The majority of them completed it in under two hours 20 minutes, which is a really respectable time, and their whole commitment and the way they trained through the summer holidays and the way they behaved on the day was brilliant.

“It was just a joy to be there.”

Money was raised using the fundraising website justgiving.com by asking family friends and anyone else to offer sponsorship.

Miss Whittle said that the first time students from the school had taken on the Great North Run it had been on the suggestion of the head teacher and chairman of governors, but this year the students approached her asking if they could do it.

As well as the staff members who took part, other teachers were involved in ferrying the runners up to Newcastle and back in cars.