SCHOOLS in Bishop Auckland will benefit from a multi-million pound Government windfall, designed to raise standards in education.

School Standards Minister Stephen Timms has announced that the town is one of 12 disadvantaged areas in the country in line for a share of a £6.5m grant from the Government's Excellence Clusters programme.

Bishop Auckland's three comprehensive schools - St John's RC, Bishop Barrington and King James First Community College - will share roughly £750,000 between them next year, along with feeder primary schools in the most deprived wards.

The money will be used to provide learning mentors to work with youngsters who are bullied, persistently late, or who experience other problems.

Learning support units will tackle disruption in the classroom, and provide specialist help to children with behavioural problems.

The funding will also help provide extra opportunities for the most talented pupils, such as extra GCSEs in low-demand subjects.

The money will be available in September next year, but plans are being made to allocate it.

One school which has made huge improvements in standards is Bishop Barrington.

It went from being one of the country's worst comprehensives to one of the best under the guidance of headteacher Keith Cotgrave, who was hand-picked by the then Education Secretary, David Blunkett, to join an elite group of "superheads".

Mr Cotgrave, who is also county president of the National Association of Head Teachers, said: "We are absolutely delighted about it. It is going to help us push even further ahead.

"The Local Education Authority - in negotiation with the schools - will get together and work on the proposal for the funding, but it is an absolutely excellent opportunity to make even further progress.

"Money coming to this part of Durham is particularly overdue in my view, or money coming to County Durham full stop."

The scheme is an extension of the Excellence in Cities scheme, which was launched in 1999 to improve standards in six urban areas.

Mr Timms said after the first year of the cities programme, results from the schools improved by about 2.3 per cent, compared with the national average of 1.3 per cent.