THE new head of one of the region's independent schools has pledged to maintain links with the community.

Marie Green, who takes over as the head of Polam Hall School, Darlington, in January, visited the school over the weekend to meet prospective pupils and parents at an open day.

She said she wanted to maintain and build on existing links with people throughout the region by encouraging pupils to do voluntary work and work experience.

She said: "Developing links with the local community is very important.

"And I know the school facilities are used by some of the town's organisations, such as the Rotary events and, of course, our facilities are available for use by the community, within reason.

"The school is also building bridges between independent and state schools, and I want to continue that.

"At the moment, Polam is planning for our language staff to go out to a number of neighbouring schools in the Darlington and North Yorkshire areas to help them start teaching languages in primary schools.

"We have a strong language provision in our junior school and we hope we can help."

Miss Green is leaving her job as head of the English department at Witherington Girls' School, in Manchester, to come to Darlington.

She has more than 26 years' experience of teaching in independent schools, in both girls' schools, boys' schools and mixed.

Miss Green succeeds Helen Hamilton, who died in April after 20 years at the school.