MALTON School is celebrating after it raised the £50,000 needed to make a bid to become one of the first schools in the country to specialise in science.

Headteacher David Roberts thanked the Gazette & Herald for its help after the newspaper issued a front-page plea to the community to do its bit to ensure the school raised the remaining £10,000 in time to meet the March 14 deadline.

Now that this has been achieved, the school can submit its bid to the Government for specialist science status.

Said Mr Roberts: "Malton School is very grateful to the students, parents, former students, friends of the school and members of the business community for such magnificent support.

"I would also like to thank the editor and team at the Gazette for the excellent publicity given to our fundraising."

The school will know by June whether its bid for specialist science status has been successful.

If the bid does succeed, the school will receive a £100,000 grant from the Government to add to the £50,000 already raised.

Each year, an additional £75,000 will paid to the school, the benefits of which will be shared between Malton School and the community.

This money will also benefit the eight primary schools within the Malton cluster, as well as Norton College and Ryedale School, from which students join the sixth form at Malton.

Mr Roberts said that the impact on equipment levels and courses that can be offered at Malton School would be significant.

It would allow a suite of six science laboratories to be built, as well as creating much-needed additional teaching space for the growing number of students at the school.

The fundraising began in September last year when the whole school raised £7,000 on its annual sponsored walk.

The school's trustees donated £10,000 and Malton Town Council £1,000, while various local businesses contributed three and four-figure sums.

Updated: 08:53 Wednesday, March 12, 2003