AFTER more than a year of trying, a Kidderminster high school has won an audience with a top education inspector in a move that could net it £600,000 and specialist business status.

The inspector will today visit Baxter College to decide if it should be granted specialist business and enterprise status, a move that would pump vital cash into the former Harry Cheshire High.

Two previous applications were rebuffed last year with a short letter from Govern-ment chiefs but a member of Her Majesty's Inspectors of Schools will today see if the school now deserves the prestigious status.

Headteacher, David Seddon, who pledged to improve results when he was appointed in 2003, hailed what he said was a significant step forward.

He said: "I feel happy somebody is coming to have a look at it because what you see in pure statistics is not what you get when you come to the school.

"I think they have realised that there is something driving this school that is worth taking a further look at."

He went on: "I think there must be a chance because of the fact that they are spending the time to come and have a look, whereas before we were just another number."

If status is granted, the Government will match £50,000 already raised by the school. This would be spent on building a cyber caf in the school grounds, for community and pupil use.

A further £125,000 would be pledged every year for the next four years as part of the package to help create a wider range of courses and provide more staff and equipment to teach youngsters the merits of good business sense, he said.

The inspector would be looking for "reassurance that the position we are in is sustainable," Mr Seddon said.

Exam results could be a sticking point, Mr Seddon added. Although grades have improved since his appointment in 2003, Baxter College still falls short of the other two high schools in the immediate area - Wolverley and King Charles I High.

The school was judged as underachieving in a 2001 inspection report by the Office for Standards in Education.

A further visit in 2003 found there had been "a significant improvement in the quality of education provided by the school".