On pace to do great things: Girls on the Run raise money for Dover animal shelter

Girls on the Run team members and coaches gather Thursday for a picture at the School Street School. (Rochester Voice photos)

ROCHESTER - Alysa Johnson and Avery Cameron are a couple of Rochester girls who are on the run, literally.

Pretty much every day you can watch the two third-graders run around the School Street School playground, not once or twice, but exactly 31 times.

That's because 31 times is exactly 3.1 miles, which is the length of a 5k run they'll be participating in later this month in Concord as part of a statewide celebration of Girls on the Run, a national self-empowerment group for girls in elementary and middle school.

GOTR Coach Christy Stokel helps team members mix the dry ingredients as they prepare to make chocolate chip cookies for today's fund-raiser to benefit the Cocheco Valley Humane Society.

In Rochester the School Street School offers girls in third and fourth grade the opportunity to be a part of the group, which meets twice a week for an hour and a half.

On Thursday the girls were busy making chocolate chip cookies for a fund-raiser today that will benefit the Cocheco Valley Humane Society of Dover.

School Street School teacher and GOTR coach Bridget Combes said part of the group's mission is to identify a Community Impact Project and then decide on a plan to help it along. She said the girls decided to make a donation to the Dover animal shelter as their project.

Proceeds from the bake sale held today during parent-teacher conferences will go CVHS.

Johnson, who wants to be a veterinarian when she grows up, said before she joined GOTR she didn't go outside a lot and didn't exercise enough, but now that's changed.

"It's making my body stronger," she said as she helped to create a bake sale poster for today's fund-raiser.

She said she runs the 31 laps around the playground every day and knows that she'll be able to complete the 5k in Concord with no problem.

"I'm proud of that," she said.

But GOTR is much more than a physical endeavor. It's also about teaching values they can be proud of, too.

"Like not gossiping," Johnson said. "It's bad and we learn in here how bad it is."

Cameron added that they also learn about "true beauty" and not letting outside voices tell them what is pretty or cool.

"Don't do what the ads in magazines say," she said. "You should be yourself and not be someone else you're not."

Asked to sum up what GOTR means to her she said, "You don't stop running and you do what you want to do."

By the way, Cameron said she runs the 31 laps around the school playground, too, and knows she'll have no trouble either.

The Nov. 17 celebration at Memorial Field in Concord will comprise some 800 girls and 200 coaches representing 58 teams from across the state.

The GOTR program takes place in all 50 states and has inspired over a million girls to recognize their limitless potential in the past 21 years.

For more info on Girls on the Run, go to https://www.girlsontherun.org/.