THOUSANDS of children have met their newly qualified teachers for the first time this week after the region’s schools were bolstered by the next generation of professionals.

Around 100 new teachers secured full-time positions at primary and secondary schools around the North-East after successfully training with the Carmel Teacher Training Partnership (CTTP).

Trainee teachers from across the North-East and North Yorkshire have spent the past year learning their craft in schools in Darlington, Sunderland, Newcastle, Gateshead, Middlesbrough, Stockton, Billingham, North and South Shields, Bishop Auckland, Durham, Washington and Bedlington.

At their recent graduation ceremony, at Carmel College, Darlington, the teachers were urged to bring life, vitality and energy to the classroom to inspire the next generation of children in their learning.

Leading national figure in education Nick Conway told graduates: “You bring us hope and new life into our schools so please be ambitious for yourselves, your pupils and your classrooms.

“Education helps you be better people and citizens and this is your opportunity to expand other people’s horizons.”

At the graduation ceremony teachers were joined by family to mark completing the course and joining a career dubbed the best in the world.

CTTP has been training teachers for the past 18 years and is one of the largest and most successful providers in the region creating professionals to open and shape the minds of countless young people.

Carmel Education Trust chief executive, Maura Regan, said: “It is important to reflect on the enormity of the fact we have so many graduates becoming teachers.

“I have had 40 years in education and it has served me very well.

“Our graduates should feel proud to have chosen such an honourable profession.”

CTTP director and principal of Carmel College, Mike Shorten, added: “A hundred trainees have worked in 64 schools, while 98 professional teachers have shared with them their love of teaching.

“There have been 500 school visits and for one primary and one secondary the assignments have totalled 27,250 words.

“You have already started to make your mark on children’s lives.”

Pupils, staff and parents at the school recently celebrated achieving some of the best GCSE results in Britain.