PRECISE funding methods may vary from government to government, depending on its political hue and the state of the economy at the time it wins power.

But one thing remains constant: getting hold of government funding for IT is a dark art shrouded in mystery. Knowing how much to ask for, which forms to fill in, and who to go to are its three main disciplines.

?If you think small, you get small. The bigger you dream, the more you get,? says Martin Coleman, IT manager at the Canterbury High School, which has been highly successful in winning funding for its pioneering use of IT throughout the school (see box).

?We know there?s money for research and development of IT in schools,? says Coleman.

Supported by the school?s headteacher and its governors, Coleman has been active in keeping track of, and applying for, government grants for IT.

Just recently, the school put in a bid for #500,000 of government funding for a remote learning project. ?We proposed linking the school via microwave to the local university, to provide direct Internet access between the two,? explains Coleman.

The bid also included upgrading the school?s PCs so that they could run Connect, a Windows NT-based educational program, as well as providing some students with laptops they could use at home.

?It was a hefty proposal, but we were looking at 60 or so laptops, plus #60,000 for the Connect software and the microwave links on top of that,? says Coleman.

The school didn?t get its #500,000 ? but it was happy with what it did get ? #16,000. ?Obviously, with #16,000 we can?t do what we intended to do, but it?s better than nothing,? says Coleman.

As a grant-maintained school, Canterbury High School falls outside the direct control of its local education authority (LEA), run by Kent County Council. It has access to IT funding from a separate department within the Department of Education.

Most of the LEA-controlled schools in England have had their eyes on the biggest government pot for IT funding since Labour came to power in May 1997: the National Grid for Learning.

?Education, education, education? goes the New Labour mantra. The government has certainly proved keen to implement a spending plan on education that includes IT, both as a specialist subject and to support other subjects across the whole National Curriculum.

The National Grid for Learning is the main feature of the government?s IT strategy for schools, intended to wire up all UK schools, colleges and libraries to the Internet, with access to a dedicated online network of educational resources by 2002.

This isn?t a cheap programme. In all, some #100 million has so far been allocated to the National Grid scheme, and the results are now being seen in a rush of tenders, as schools attempt to get their newly-funded equipment installed before the start of the next school year in September.

But how has this money ? not to mention other funding, such as the #230 million programme to train teachers IT skills to support the core curriculum, and the #23 million project to provide multimedia laptops in schools ? been doled out to the UK?s 33,000 schools?

First, schools in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland can forget National Grid funding, since the scheme applies only in England. Even within the National Grid programme, it?s up to the LEAs, rather than individual schools, to decide the level of funds asked for, and to which schools they will eventually go.

The amounts LEAs have been awarded under the first stage of the National Grid scheme vary enormously, partly because the scheme runs on matched funding ? anything the LEA gets from the government, it has to match from its own resources. The net result is that there is no universal application of National Grid money.

The amounts with which each school could end up cover a wide range, says Brenda O?Sullivan, managing director of educational IT specialist Xemplar, which is joint-owned by Acorn and Apple.

?Each LEA has its own approach to funds allocation,? he comments. ?Some will allocate the same amount to each of its schools, for them to spend as they want, while others take a completely different approach and spend the funds on the schools? behalf, believing that way they get the best prices and infrastructure. And there are shades of difference all the way in between those two ends of the spectrum. As a supplier, we have to deal with all these situations.?

In some cases, suppliers do work closely with individual schools, particularly the specialist schools originally set up by the previous Conservative government.

Archbishop Temple School in Preston, for example, already had links with British Aerospace and a good record in technology when it applied to become a specialist technology school. The school put #100,000 towards a new network and hardware, with the rest of the cost shared equally between British Aerospace and leading schools IT supplier, RM.

But most schools aren?t looking to become specialist schools, they simply want more investment in their IT. O?Sullivan points out that suppliers can?t work with all 33,000 UK schools on an individual basis, so instead most of the companies aim to work with LEAs.

As the money starts to flow through from the first wave of National Grid funding, pressure on suppliers is increasing. O?Sullivan reckons his company is dealing with 10 times the number of tenders it would usually handle.

?We are getting lots of tender requests now,? he says. ?Authorities want to see programmes up and running by September. Some are realistic ? they recognise that if the whole nation tries to put in their new computer systems by September, there are practical issues, but it is a fast pace and a huge challenge for everyone involved.?

The increased funding for IT in schools is also changing the education IT market, with new suppliers, not surprisingly being attracted by the greater amount of business.

?There are new people coming in ? that?s natural,? says O?Sullivan. ?When you get amounts like #100 million, of course the vultures begin to circle. But we?re confident that our educational experience will stand us in good stead. We?re selling educationally credible systems, not just bits of tin.?

Supplier RM is similarly confident. Phil Hemmings, the company?s head of corporate affairs, says the National Grid for Learning isn?t just about buying a few PCs. Schools and LEAs are also looking for good packages, Internet access and support. ?If you look at the list of companies with experience in this area of supporting educational software content and Internet access, it?s very short,? he says.

Hemmings acknowledges, however, that PC suppliers will also do well in many areas, as schools use funds to replace ageing equipment and buy more PCs.

Notebook manufacturer Hi-Grade, for instance, won its first educational contract earlier this year in a #2.7 million deal to supply multimedia laptops for teachers.

Michael Bell, contracts manager at Hi-Grade, says deals like this can?t just be scooped up, but do require time and effort being put in by suppliers.

?It?s a hard market and it has taken us a little while to win this deal,? he comments. ?But this is the first year we?ve been involved in this particular process, so we?re pleased to have won this contract.?

The growth in the schools market isn?t restricted to England. In Scotland ? where schools are not eligible for funding from the National Grid for Learning ? the knock-on effect of the government?s scheme has been felt, according to O?Sulllivan.

His company has just signed a #1 million deal with Edinburgh City Council to provide 1,000 Internet-ready Apple Macs to schools across the city, as part of a #6 million investment by the council in getting all its schools online by the turn of the century.

?That deal is nothing to do with the National Grid scheme, but since the whole scheme is a vision for schools, any authority looking at implementing systems will want to ensure they are in line with the scheme,? he says.

?That is what has happened in Edinburgh, even though the funds have been generated locally, rather than through the National Grid scheme.?

While suppliers eye up the potential of the education IT market, and the incumbent suppliers hope that their track record will help keep existing customers loyal, school IT managers themselves are largely at the mercy of their LEAs for IT funding. This has worried some educational specialists, who argue that the system is more like a lottery than a scheme to bring a universal IT infrastructure into the UK?s schools.

So far, however, there appears to be little chance of change. It is up to those switched-on school IT managers to bag as much of the funding as they can.

IT in education: Canterbury High School

The Canterbury High School spends #80,000 a year on IT. Not huge by commercial standards, perhaps, but a large amount of money for the average UK secondary school: most state secondary schools spend under #20,000 a year on IT. There are 170 PCs in use at the school as part of the regular teaching of academic subjects, supported on a five-server curriculum network. There is also a separate administrative network and a Web server, providing carefully controlled access to the Internet. ?If it?s not suitable for my five-year-old son, we don?t let pupils near it,? says IT manager Martin Coleman. The school has been involved in several projects using its Internet access and videoconferencing equipment, including pupils running an Internet workshop in Florence for European teachers, an online videoconference link into an EU foreign ministers? meeting in Dublin, and linking up via Internet video with 12 other schools around the world for Worldnet Day