A SCHOOL has raised awareness of the plight of refugees by displaying the remains of a refugee boat.

Cardinal Newman Catholic School in Hove displayed a cross made from pieces of a wrecked refugee boat .

The piece is being displayed in assemblies throughout the week with a presentation about the refugee crisis.

Students are also donating old shoes to give to the young people in the camps in Calais which will be donated via the Refugee Youth Service. Since the campaign started just over a week ago, the school has collected 400 pairs.

For many pupils the cross has been a stark reminder of the migrants’ plight. Wesley Micklethwaite,12, said: “It is quite upsetting, especially hearing their stories of their difficult journey to get here.

Pearl Belgrave, who has visited the The Jungle camp in Calais, said: “We helped at a foodbank there in the evening. There were lots of people and they were all quite desperate to get the food.

“It felt good to go over there and help them. We are very lucky and privileged to live here in Hove.”

The cross was made by Francesco Tuccio, a local carpenter in Lampedusa, Italy. Migrants travel to the island, Italy’s most southerly point closer to Africa than Europe, from Libya and the route has become one of the deadliest migrant route in the world.

In October 2013 a fire broke out on an overcrowded wooden boat and sank off the Italian coast and of more than 500 people on board only 155 survived. In April 2015 more than 800 people are feared to have drowned when a boat sank in Libyan waters off Lampedusa.

One Sunday in 2011 Francesco Tuccio was moved by Eritrean and Somali migrants among the congregation at Mass in his local church, who were weeping for drowned love ones.

After the service the carpenter went to the beach and began collecting the blistered, brightly coloured driftwood from the wreckage of migrant boats that had washed up on Lampedusa’s shores.

The carpenter wanted the crosses to be a symbol of their salvation from the sea and as a sign of hope for the future.

The cross was brought over by the Diocese of Arundel and Brighton who donated it to the school for the week, after the Pope asked for the crosses to be distributed to schools around Europe.

Roger Galvin, Head of RE, said: “It is important to sometimes step back and reflect. “Having the Lampedusa cross in school is a great opportunity to reflect a bit more personally on the plight of those who make this desperate journey to find a new life.

“The fact that the cross is physically connected to those crossing the sea is a powerful thing and helps the heart speak to heart, human feel for human.

“It is a powerful thing.”