STAFF and students of Teesdale School gave a very warm welcome to their Connecting Classrooms Project visitor, Rafia Naz, from Pakistan.

For the last three years the school, with support from the British Council, has partnered with the Government Girls Higher Comprehensive Secondary School, in Abbottabad, a school of 3,000 girls in the city which lies in the north west of Pakistan.

This year’s project involved studying the impact of war, specifically World War One in the local area and students in both schools looked at the personal impact of war as well as the wider issues of conflict resolution.

The project aims to prepare young people for the world as global citizens with Mrs Naz spending a week at the school.

She gave an assembly where she showed the students what her school is like, what her students think about their education and what their hopes and aspirations are as well as spending time with different year groups.

Mrs Naz also met with Durham County Council chairman, John Robinson, in his office at County Hall.

Co-principal, Simon Maguire, said: “Students enjoyed the talk Rafia gave in assembly as well as meeting her face-to-face during the visit and we look forward to developing further links in the New Year.”