This month, 45 students in Years 8 and 9 have travelled to Holland for a five-day action-packed trip. Organised by our PE Department, this bi-annual experience is an extremely popular international opportunity, especially for our young football fans.

With both boys and girls attending, the trip involved pro-football training sessions at the KNVB Campus, which is not only the training centre for all of the Netherlands national teams, but also where professional coaches receive their training and qualifications. Students also played a number of friendly fixtures against young footballers in the Woerden U13s and U14s, and two of the SV Houten teams.

The experience wasn’t all about football however. Students enjoyed eating out each night and taking part in a range of activities including ten pin bowling, a tour of the Ajax Stadium, which is home to the most successful club in Holland, shopping in Utrecht and in Amsterdam, a visit to the Rijksmuseum art gallery, and also a trip to Duinrell Theme Park and Tiki Pool.

To prepare for the trip, students took part in two fundraising activities to generate money to subsidise the cost of activities whilst in Holland. Thanks to a sponsored walk from Durham to Bishop Auckland, and a fancy-dress fun run around our 4G football pitch, students raised over £4,000! This helped to make sure that that trip was affordable for everyone.