Estelle Morris may have been a bit late handing in her homework (it was, after all, due in by the end of last term), but it certainly landed with a hefty thump on teachers' desks as the new school year began last week.

The education White Paper, the blueprint for Labour's second term, contains exceedingly ambitious plans. Every state secondary school in England will be affected by it.

Despite a certain amount of soft-pedalling on the rhetoric of involving the private sector, the plans themselves will certainly provide new opportunities for private companies to get involved in opening, running, or revitalising state schools.

This will be the focus for the political battle as the unions and the political Left wage war in defence of the public service ethos in schools, hospitals and transport.

It will be an intriguing debate and, if the private sector does get a firm foothold in the education system, there will be major long-term implications for schooling.

Happening already

But in the shorter term there is another, much more significant, change already underway. The development that teachers, parents and students will notice first is the expansion of the specialist schools programme.

The reality, of course, is that specialist schools are different and will be seen by parents as different

England already has 685 specialist schools. The White Paper has set a target of increasing that to 1,500 by 2005. That would encompass almost half the maintained secondary schools.

It could well go further still: Estelle Morris hopes that within four years "every school in the country that wishes to will either be a specialist school or will have chosen which specialism it is working towards".

Now there are two ways of looking at specialist schools. The government prefers the incremental, or defensive view, preferring to emphasise that they are only a modernisation, not a denial, of the comprehensive tradition.

Ministers insist there is no fundamental difference between specialist schools and neighbourhood or "bog standard" comprehensives.

They argue that they have no advantages or privileges, that they still teach the full range of subjects and that the vast majority of them do not, and will not, select their pupils.

They are different

In which case, why is the government is so keen to promote them?

Specialists are likely to be popular

The reality, of course, is that specialist schools are different and will be seen by parents as different.

For a start, they must raise �50,000 sponsorship before they are awarded specialist status. This triggers additional government money, worth up to �600,000 over four years. That alone is a considerable difference.

On top of this they get a new, fancier name with the prestigious word "college" in the title. Now, ask any 15 year-old whether they would rather say they go to "school" or to "college" and you will soon discover they think the latter sounds more grown up.

Parents are not immune from similar snobbery. Image does matter.

The Technology College or the Languages College will also find it easier to attract the best teachers in its chosen specialism. Which languages teacher wouldn't choose to work at a school which has both made languages its main focus and has extra money for language facilities?

Sharing unlikely

It is like asking a financial journalist whether they would rather write for the Financial Times or the Daily Star.

It seems an odd way to transform the secondary school system

So even though specialist colleges will continue to teach the whole national curriculum they will inevitably attract the best teachers in their featured subject.

At the same time, they may struggle to keep staff in departments which feel they are not at the heart of the school's ethos (the science teachers in the Languages College, for example).

I know the government says specialist schools will have to share their new facilities and expertise with other schools but I suspect such co-operation will founder on impracticality and competition.

As one head teacher observed, that is like expecting Liverpool football club to lend Michael Owen to Everton for every second weekend of the season.

Left behind

So, even if a specialist school decides not to select 10% of pupils on the basis of "aptitude" (and no-one has yet convinced me this is very different from selection by ability) it will have several advantages over other schools.

That is why schools are scrambling to become specialist colleges and why the government's target is likely to be exceeded.

It was just the same under the Conservative government when schools were encouraged to opt-out of council control: The first few went for ideological reasons. The rest followed because they got a lot of extra money for doing so.

But there will still be some schools left behind and these will have no prestigious new name, will not be magnet to specialist teachers, and will not benefit from extra money and facilities. It will be hard for them not to be seen as second best.

It seems an odd way to transform the secondary school system.

If the government wants to develop genuine specialist schools they should allow them to select far more than 10% of pupils.

Surely, if you believe there is a case for separate technology, languages or business schools it makes sense to ensure the right pupils are matched to the right schools (although 11 still seems a bit young to decide that).

Failing that, if they genuinely intend them to be no more than modernised comprehensives, then surely the �50,000 entry fee, the differential funding and the 10% selection option should be withdrawn.