TWO schools in East Lancashire are celebrating after being awarded prestigious Leading Edge status.

St Augustine's Roman Catholic School, Elker Lane, Billington, and Our Lady and St John Catholic Arts College, North Road, Blackburn, will receive £60,000 each year for the next three years to develop links with other schools and share best practice.

The move came as school standards minister David Millibrand, also announced the largest ever round of schools being upgraded to specialist colleges, including Mount Carmel RC High School, Accrington.

The Leading Edge programme is specific to secondary schools and aims to encourage an accelerated pace of change and improvement and there should be 300 across the country by 2006. It replaces the Beacon programme, which credited the two schools on their high standards, along with Habergham High, in Burnley. Our Lady and St Johns, already a specialist arts college, hopes to use the opportunity to build stronger local partnerships.

Head teacher Colette Gillen, said: "I am absolutely delighted as it is recognition for all the staff's hard work to meet the needs of the youngsters in our care and our innovative approach to finding new ways to motivate pupils and raise standards.

"Our aim is to collaborate with other institutions in a focused way and raise standards not only at Our Lady's but for all pupils involved.

"The most exciting feature of the Leading Edge programme is the fact that it is led by teachers and school leaders."

Coun Mahfooz Hussain, Blackburn with Darwen Council's executive member for education and lifelong learning, said it was a 'fantastic' achievement.

For St Augustine's RC High School, staff and pupils were celebrating a double whammy after their school was designated specialist science status, as well as a Leading Edge performer.

A total of 60 local businesses rallied round to help the Elker Lane school raise £50,000 in sponsorship.

The school now plans to use the extra windfall to build a state-of-the-art teaching room for science and maths, which can also be used by the local community.

Headteacher, Anthony McNamara, described the news as 'excellent.'

"Both the head of maths and the head of science put a tremendous amount of work into the specialist bid," he said.

"We thought long and hard before putting a bid together because it's such a big commitment to make. We're indebted to the local businesses who helped us. The Leading Edge news is also fantastic because a lot of work had to go into the bid."

Mount Carmel was awarded specialist science status and head teacher Katrina Ryan said: "This is a landmark in the history of the school and the culmination of five years of hard work in driving up standards.

"This achievement will not only benefit the school but will have a significant impact on lifelong learning opportunities for the community."