PICTURES: 'Lucky mascot' St Clement's pupils in Dingwall hit the right note with Ross County Football Club as song set for video treatment with help from UHI students
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LINKS forged between pupils at a Dingwall school and the town’s top-flight football club are being strengthened with production of a special music video and song from the lucky mascots.
Locals in the county town may have caught a glimpse of filming last week involving St Clement’s and Ross County FC.
Teacher Paul Oparka said: “My class developed links with the club last season when, as a means of reaching out beyond the Covid restrictions, we sent in letters of encouragement, player portraits and match reports to the club. We also undertook a lot of cross-curricular work exploring RCFC stats and the rules and nuances of the great game.”
He joked: “Our interest coincided with County’s remarkable end of season run and, as such, my class do claim some of the credit for the Staggies top-flight survival.”
Since then, County have kindly offered tickets to allow increasing numbers of pupils to attend matches.
Mr Oparka said: “We have done so now twice (v Dundee 3-2 win and v St Johnstone 3-1 win). This has been great in getting our young people back out into their community as restrictions have eased.”
After discovering a song called C Is For Cookies by the Cookie Monster, an idea was hatched and permission secured from legendary TV series Sesame Street to adapt the song.
With his musically inclined teenage sons, Mr Oparka recorded the backing track and then recorded the kids singing the song.
The Pupil Council then decided to record a music video that could be used to raise funds to support a number of pupil-led projects.
With support from Anna MacPherson at UHI and Stuart MacDonald Butler, marketing manager at RCFC, filming started at the stadium after kids created a storyboard circulated to all involved.
A fun filming session included visits to Deas the baker.
Mr Oparka said: “We sang outside the shop and several staff and one pupil got a cream cake in the face. There were quite a few folk that came out of the shops to see what we were up to and we all had great craic!”
County’s Steven Ferguson, Malky MacKay, Don Cowie, Regan Charles Cook – dubbed The Cookie Monster – Jack Baldwin and Jordan Tillson all joined in the singing in the main stand. The players and all the kids then took to the pitch and had a kickabout with the County players and staff.
A video will follow with a link so that people can follow to make donations to support efforts to improve the learning experiences of young people at St Clement’s.
Mr Opark added: “Further than that, Ross County Football Club have clearly indicated that they are fully behind St Clement’s as we look to strengthen links between the club and school to our mutual benefit.”
RCFC’s Stuart Macdonald Butler said the club was delighted to strengthen its links and had been hugely encouraged by the children’s support.
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