North-East England is one of the nine official regions of England and comprises the combined area of Northumberland, County Durham, Tyne and Wear and a small part of North Yorkshire. The North East has the lowest GDP/capita in England.
The highest point in the region is The Cheviot, in Northumberland, at 815 metres (2,674 ft). The principal city is Newcastle, with the largest city in terms of area and population being Sunderland.
As well as its urban centres of Tyneside, Wearside and Teesside the region is also noted for the richness of its natural beauty. Northumberland National Park, the region's coastline, its section of the Pennines and Weardale provides evidence for this. It also has great historic importance, the evidence of which is seen in Northumberland's Castles and the two World Heritage Sites of Durham Cathedral and Hadrian's Wall.
The shipbuilding industry that once dominated both Wearside and Tyneside suffered a terrible decline during the second half of the twentieth century. Tyneside is now re-inventing itself as an international centre of art and culture and, through The Centre For Life, scientific research (especially in stem cell technology). After suffering economic decline during the last century, Wearside is becoming an important area for quaternary industry, science and high technology. The economy of Teesside is largely based on its petrochemical industry. Northumberland, being largely rural, bases its economy on farming and tourism.
In May 2005 the 'Passionate people. Passionate places' Regional Image campaign was launched to promote North East England as a great place to work, study, visit and invest in.

Local government
The region was created in 1994 and was originally defined as Northumberland, Tyne and Wear, County Durham and Cleveland. As part of a reform of local government Cleveland has since been abolished and several unitary districts created. The North East has been considered to be very religious especially County Durham, some of the scenery in the outlying villages is amongst the best in the land.
The region is now considered to consist of four distinct 'sub-regions':

County Durham
Northumberland
Tyne and Wear
Tees Valley (former Cleveland area plus Darlington) History
The region has been counted as the most friendly in the UK, Newcastle attracts thousands of visitors per month such as Stag and Hen partys.

Friendly City
The region has a rich natural heritage, its diverse landscape includes maritime cliffs and extensive moorland containing a number of rare species of flora and fauna. Of particular importance are the saltmarshes of Lindisfarne,the Tees Estuary, the heaths, bogs and traditional upland hay meadows of the North Pennines, the distinctive Arctic-alpine flora of Upper Teesdale, the Farne Islands (which contain rare seabirds such as the Roseate Tern) and the Magnesian Limestone grasslands of East Durham - a habitat found nowhere else in the world. The North East also features woodland such as Kielder Forest, the largest man-made forest in Europe. This is located within Northumberland National Park and contains an important habitat for the endangered red squirrel. The region is the English stronghold of black grouse and contains 80-90% of the UK population ofyellow marsh saxifrage.

Biodiversity
Most important towns in the North East are on the East Coast Main Line, with fast connections to London and Edinburgh, as well as being close to the A1 or A19. However, north of Morpeth, the A1 is single carriageway. There is the Newcastle International Ferry Terminal at North Shields. DFDS operate two ferries a day to Amsterdam and one a day on the Stavanger - Haugesund - Bergen route. The two main airports are Newcastle Airport and Durham Tees Valley Airport. The Tyne and Wear Metro is a light rail network which serves the metropolitan county of Tyne and Wear, with stations in both Sunderland and Newcastle city centres, other towns and suburbs in the county, as well as at Newcastle Airport and other attractions such as The Stadium of Light, St. James' Park and Gateshead Inernational Staidum

Economy
The North East education system consists of largely comprehensive schools but with a number of private and independent schools found in Newcastle, Sunderland, Durham, Stockton and Northumberland in particular. At GCSE level, the region performs similar to other largely urban areas although generally results are below the national average. Middlesbrough performs the worst with average results significantly below the national average for England, followed closely by Newcastle and Sunderland. Both Northumberland and North Tyneside perform above average, with Northumberland the best. St Thomas More R.C. School in Blaydon (a voluntary funded Roman Catholic specialist technology college) and Emmanuel College (a selective independent state school) are two of the best performing schools in Gateshead. Other well performing schools in the region include Gateshead High School for Girls, Westfield School in Newcastle,Park View Community School in Durham and Lord Lawson of Beamish Community School in Birtley.
At A-level, local education authorities in the north east are improving at a greater rate than the national average, but produce results substantially below other areas of the England. Sunderland performs the best, followed by Darlington and Redcar and Cleveland. South Tyneside is the worst performing LEAs at A-level in the region.
The independent and private schools in the area perform highly. Central Newcastle High School and Royal Grammar School, Newcastle were both named in the top 100 independent schools nationally in 2006. Other well-performing private schools include Durham School, one of the oldest schools in England and Grindon Hall Christian School in Sunderland, a private non-selective school. The private schools out-perform the state schools.

Education
At the higher education level the North East contains a number of internationally acclaimed universities. These include the University of Durham, the third oldest university in England; Newcastle University, a member of the Russel Group and the newer universities of Northumbria University, Sunderland University and the University of Teesside.

1. Cleveland College of Art and Design (910)
2. Queen Elizabeth Sixth Form College
3. Durham Johnston Comprehensive School
4. Queen Elizabeth High School, Hexham
5. Park View Community School
6. St Robert of Newminster Roman Catholic School
7. King Edward VI School, Morpeth
8. Cramlington Community High School
9. Bede College
10. Longbenton Community College (803) Local media

Bands and musicians from the North East
List of schools in the North East of England