A row has broken out over the use of GNVQ courses in Bradford schools to boost young people's qualifications at 16.

Some schools are forcing too many youngsters to sit the vocational course in information technology, which is worth four GCSE passes, one head teacher claimed today.

Bruce Berry, head teacher at Belle Vue Boys' School, said he believed some schools "played the system" and saw the GNVQs as a way of ensuring higher scores in league tables.

But the courses may not be the best bet for some students, who would be better focusing on the mainstream GCSEs demanded by employers, Mr Berry claimed. "We considered doing the information technology GNVQ but decided against it," he said. "Some schools are doing it for the right reasons but others are doing it for the wrong reasons.

"What will employers think of it? They will still demand Maths and English GCSEs which is also what you need to go on to a modern apprenticeship."

The GNVQ IT course has been popularised by the Thomas Telford college, the highest-performing state school in the country. Many other schools have now followed that school's lead by introducing the same course for pupils aged 14 to 16.

The intermediate GNVQ counts as equivalent to four GCSE passes at grades A to C. Success for students in the course can have a startling impact on a school's league table position which is based on how many of its pupils gain five good passes. But the exam course was defended by John Lewis, principal at Dixons City Technology College, where the numbers gaining the five A to C grades benchmark jumped by 18 per cent this year.

The lowest-performing pupils at his school followed a streamlined curriculum this time, dropping some subjects including modern languages but all sitting the intermediate GNVQ.

"All but two succeeded in gaining the full intermediate level, so 18 out of the group of 20 only had to pick up one additional full GCSE to get the headline figure of five A-C passes," he said. "Under the old system, they may well have come out with nothing. They can now say they have got the benchmark. What employers will make of it is up to them."

John Player, head at The Grange School in Great Horton, said 60 of his students had volunteered to study the IT GNVQ after school as an extra.

"They have learned useful skills such as writing stuff into databases, they are genuinely ICT literate, which will help them to be successful post 16," he said.

And at Bingley Grammar, head teacher John Patterson was pleased with the GNVQ which students studied as an add-on rather than replacement to conventional courses. It meant some of his students could rack up as many as 15 GCSE passes.

"There are many schools around the country using the Thomas Telford materials, but I don't know of any other where pupils have studied the entire course in their own time," he said.