The country's biggest teaching union has criticised the Government's latest idea involving the creation of so-called beacon schools.

The schools, 100 in all, will be given a £1.8m cash bonus to develop their status as centres of excellence and will be expected to share their secrets with other schools in the area.

The bone of contention however, is that the schools are being chosen solely from Ofsted's 1995/96 annual report, which could include the Garden Suburb Infant School and The Compton School in Finchley.

Doug McAvoy, the National Union of Teachers general secretary, said he rejected suggestions that the chosen schools represent the sum total of successful schools in the education system.

He said: "These schools are in the list by chance, having been inspected at a particular time. I would not accept any suggestion that these schools are better than schools which have had no opportunity to be included in this Oscar winners list."

Compton's headteacher Andrew Macalpine said he had not yet decided on whether to apply for beacon status.

On his return from last Thursday's conference where the idea was announced, he said: "The idea that they are beacon schools may be suggesting that those schools are star schools in every respect, but that's not the case.

"We have areas of strength in our school that other schools would benefit from sharing with us, but at the same time we have taken things from other schools.

"What should really come out of this is some sort of national database of good practise in every area we can think of," he said.

Speaking at the Celebrating and Building on Success Conference, School Standards Minister Stephen Byers said beacon schools would help prevent less successful schools "floundering on the rocks of failure". The first group of schools will start in Autumn 1998.

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