St Bees School will reopen its doors to pupils next year.

A statement from the school's trustees, released today, said they have created a partnership with Shenzhen International, a South East Asian education group and the school will reopen in September 2018.

The 432-year-old school closed in June 2015, due to falling pupil numbers, and the new board of trustees was formed to investigate if it could reopen again.

The statement said: "Trustees have remained focused in their objective to re-establish learning and education at St Bees School.

As such, the partnership has been established, with an agreement now in place for the reopening of the school.

"Shenzhen International has been chosen for this partnership as their values are fully supportive to the ethos of the school.

"The partnership has a clear and unified vision of educating global leaders for the internationally mobile world.

"The commitment is to provide high quality academic education combined with a focus on personal development. St Bees School will be welcoming day and boarding pupils from West Cumbria, further afield in the UK and internationally, providing an opportunity for the pupils to form lifelong friendships across the globe."

The trustees added that the partnership was committed to developing 'bespoke' learning programmes for pupils.

The statement said: "Strong links with the community have been established over the last two years and local clubs, history groups and businesses have continued to make use of the school’s facilities.

"It is essential to the future success of the school that these links are maintained and the trustees will work with local bodies to support the West Cumbrian economy and sustain diversity in the community.

"The school has a rich and proud history of over 400 years and will retain the ethos and its Christian values, yet will look to innovate with state of the art teaching methodology and techniques, where appropriate."