THE headteacher at Pedmore High School has moved to reassure parents after a knife was seized by police when they took along a screening arch to the school.

Stourbridge Police took to Twitter to highlight the knife arch initiative on Monday (March 11) - a pilot project as part of a blitz on crimes involving blades - which they said resulted in "one knife being seized out of nearly 600 pupils". 

Gareth Lloyd, headteacher at the Grange Lane secondary school, however, has since moved to reassure parents and the school community "that no knives were brought into school".

In a Facebook post he said: "The knife found was a craft knife similar to the ones we use in our design and technology department, the knife hadn’t been stashed or obscured from view but was left in plain sight on a window sill of the corridor that the students left through."

He said staff have checked CCTV and they have not been able to determine who left te blade there - adding: "What is most likely is that a student had used the craft knife in design and technology and then, either accidentally or other, put the knife in their pocket. Then realising what was happening, panicked and left the knife on the window sill."

Mr Lloyd said as a result of the incident processes and policies concerning school equipment would be "scrutinised and improved" and he added: "We have a social responsibility to our community and are passionate about ensuring our environment is safe, which is why we offered full co-operation to WPC Lees and her team.

"The process has been wholly positive and are very happy with the support and resources that have been made available to us by the Neighbourhood Team.

"We would like to reassure our parents and community that the safety and personal development of our students, in that order, are at the heart of everything we do, and the decisions we make."

A spokesman for the Invictus Education Trust, which Pedmore High School is part of, added: "Any student found bringing in anything that could be used as a weapon will be removed from the school immediately."

West Midlands Police have not yet confirmed whether the knife arch will be taken to schools across the borough.