STUDENTS from Droitwich Spa High School managed to raise nearly £800 for a Birmingham-based charity farm recently with a non-uniform day.

Two year 11 students Tom Southwick and Steven Behan have been visiting Gloverspiece Mini Farm, which is run as a charity, every week since last September in a work placement as part of their alternative curriculum.

The farm offers a range of opportunities for people to get close to the animals from a forest school and activity days, to roadshows which visit schools and care homes, work experience placements, and volunteering opportunities.

The two students have been learning the correct way to work with and care for the wide range of animals housed at the farm including horses, ponies, donkeys, sheep, goats, pigs, ducks, geese, quails, cats, dogs, rabbits, guinea pigs, ferrets, raccoons and alpacas.

Ms Rebecca Piesse, the teacher in charge of their placement, is full of praise for the boys. She said: “They have been brilliant. I am so proud of the way they have got on with the range of things they are asked to do at the farm. They have done a range of jobs, including feeding, watering and cleaning the animals, mucking out stables, lots of poo picking, maintenance of fences and exercising the animals. As we have just come out of the wettest winter on record, it has often been very cold, wet and muddy but the two lads have not missed a week and have never complained about the conditions. In fact they love it.”

Some of the £776 raised by the school will go towards the on-going care of the animals, as well as developing the travelling road show, with the majority being invested into a brand new barn with a kitchen, toilets, classroom area, hand washing facilities, a laundry, an office, first aid and small animal area.