A SPECIAL school in North Yorkshire has welcomed Richmond MP William Hague to open new classrooms.

Mowbray School, based in Bedale, invited Mr Hague to open two new classrooms and a classroom extension, which will provide an extra 96sqm of teaching space.

It will enable more students to attend the school which is highly regarded for its approaches in developing language, communication, social and vocational life skills in children with special needs.

The £151,000 cost of the two new classrooms was raised through carefully managing the schools revenue income.

Headteacher Jonathan Tearle said: “The children helped to show Mr Hague around the new classrooms, as well as the animals in the school farm and sport hall.

“We were delighted that Mr Hague gave us some of his time to open the classrooms – he has not been to the school for around five years and he said he thought the school was fabulous, and was very pleased to see the progress and changes that had been made.

“It was lovely to see him with the children – he is very good with them and spent a lot of time chatting to them.”

One of the classrooms is a specialist music room, accessed by all pupils and a secondary tutor class, the other classroom is the secondary humanities base for year 11 pupils.

Mr Tearle added that the classrooms have excellent ICT facilities, are designed to be bright airy and conducive to promoting learning.

He added: “Special thanks must go to architect Robert O’Brien and Acomb Construction in Richmond, as well as Robert Dunning, chair of governors, for his continual support for the school.”