Kindy on the hunt for funding

Cromwell Kindergarten staff, children and parents are organising a hunting competition to raise funds for its new whanau room, to be added on to the building. Photo / Leith Huffadine.

Cromwell's oldest child care centre is hunting for funding.

The Cromwell Kindergarten, which has been operating for about 35 years, is hosting a hunting competition later this month, in order to raise funds for a whanau room, the first phase in about $400,000 of upgrades.

Kindergarten vice-president Rebecca Farr said the majority of each $30 entry fee would go towards the project. She hoped the competition would raise a thousand dollars.

''To make a grand on it would be really great. It does not seem like much, but every little bit helps.''

Miss Farr said the idea of a hunting competition fundraiser came from a kindergarten in Maniototo, which had successfully run a similar event.

She encouraged the community to get out and support the kindergarten by participating the the competition, which was set to begin on Thursday, April 24.

The kindergarten had received funding from the Central Lakes Trust, the Otago Community Trust and the Trusts Community Foundation for the upgrade.

However, more than 20% of the funds for the new Whanau room, expected to cost about $140,000, had been raised through kindergarten efforts, she said.

An extension of the current building, the room would be a quiet area for purposes such as concentrated learning.

Construction was under way and was expected to be completed in early June.

Further stages in the kindergarten upgrade would include updating the kitchen and bathroom, as well as a new internal fit-out of the main room.

Categories in the hunting competition would include heaviest red deer, heaviest fallow buck, and heaviest boar, among others.

A ''kid's critter'' category required children to collect a ''bag'' which contained one hare, one rabbit, a possum, a magpie, and one fish.

Prizes included a $2000 guided hunt at the Glenroy Hunting Lodge in the Gibbston Valley, and numerous spot prizes.

A cash prize would be presented if the number of entries allowed money to be withdrawn from the funding.

So far, the competition had received fewer than 10 entries.

Entries close on April 21 for the event, which runs from April 24-April 27.