* Most links are established using a specialist organisation

* Many programmes steer away from any aid relationship. Oxfam would rather fund-raising was not part of linking at all

* First visits, typically lasting two weeks, are usually made by teachers who stay with local families and return ready to enthuse others

* Linking is not expensive - the British Council has an overview of what’s going on and administers a variety of grants

* Children on visits to Gambia and Ghana have helped to build classroom blocks - and fence a mango orchard

* Kelvin Hall school in Hull has links with schools in St Petersburg, Sierra Leone, Transylvania, Germany and Estonia