Families at St Mary's College have been putting bags of efforts into fundraising for the school.

Members of the Parents' Association have been organising collections of surplus items such as clothing, bedding, curtains, shoes, belts and handbags to be sold for reuse abroad or recycling at home.

In the bag - St Mary's students load up the Bag2School van with material collected by the Parents' Association.

The material goes to the Northallerton-based organisation Bag2School which has helped schools to raise more than £5 million over the past eight years.

Bag2School say their collections also help to reduce the amount of textiles going to landfill sites which is estimated to be more than one million tonnes a year.

Money raised by the St Mary's Parents' Association is used to buy extra equipment and organise additional activities for the college, its prep school the Mount and its Bright Sparks nursery facility.

Recent purchases have ranged from TVs, DVD players and computer software to indoor athletics equipment and costumes for a nativity play.

St Mary's College spokesman, Dr Trevor Lane, commented: "The Parents' Association do a fantastic job for the college and the Bag2School collection is just the latest in a long line of innovative fundraising projects they have been involved with".

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