Mum’s fury over school’s stance after daughter handed in knife
MUM SAYS DAUGHTER UNFAIRLY EXCLUDED FOR HANDING IN PAL’S KNIFE AT SCHOOL
A MUM claims her daughter has been unfairly excluded from school after handing a multi-tool containing a knife over to her teachers.
Demi Mountford, 12, says she surrendered the bladed item to her science teacher at the Co-op Academy Manchester in Blackley after finding it in her blazer pocket.
The school says it is ‘never acceptable or safe’ to hand a knife into school, and that doing so results in ‘permanent exclusion.’
Yet Demi claims she’d confiscated the knife from a school friend at a park for his own protection.
The Year 8 pupil said she’d put it in her blazer pocket and then forgotten about it. It was only when Demi leaned down to her bag in a science lesson that she realised the knife was still in her pocket.
Demi, from Blackley, said she informed her class teacher about the knife immediately and they asked her to go to the head of year. She was asked to write out a statement, praised for handing it in and sent back to her lesson.
But later that day, Demi says she was pulled out of class and told she was being excluded for having a knife in school.
Mum Lisa McNab said: “I don’t understand why Demi has been punished for doing the right thing,” said Lisa. “Her science teacher and the head of year said that when she first handed it in. Her friend said he was carrying this multi-tool with a knife because he’d been beaten up by three older lads.
“When he told her that she told him it was stupid to carry knives, and that people would go after him with a weapon if they knew. She took it off him for his own protection and then went out for her friend’s birthday tea. She’d just come home, had a bath and gone straight to bed. She’d hung her blazer up as normal and grabbed it on her way out.
“When she realised the next day she told her teacher straight away.
“They even said to her, ‘Well done, Demi. You’ve done the right thing.’
“That’s why she couldn’t understand it when they fetched her out again. They said ‘you need to take your tie and blazer off, you’re permanently excluded and you need to leave the premises now.’ To me she’s been unfairly punished. She could have prevented something serious from happening to someone else. She explained why she had it and told the teacher straight away.”
Demi was given work to do at home on Friday until the head, Steve Brice, had met with school governors. The mum, 41, says she then received an email from the head explaining that it was his intention to permanently exclude Demi.
“After careful consideration, it is my intention to permanently exclude Demi from the academy with effect Monday 23rd September 2019,” the email said. Lisa, a mum-of-four, believes that they haven’t been given a fair hearing by the school and is now in contact with other schools to find her daughter a place.
A spokesman for the Co-op Academy Manchester said: “The academy’s first priority is the safety and wellbeing of the whole school community – all students and staff.
“It is never acceptable or safe for a student to bring a knife into our academy as this compromises the safety of everyone else. All students are clear that bringing a knife into the academy results in permanent exclusion, and are reminded of it at the start of every academic year. Any decisions to permanently exclude a student are not taken lightly, and are done in accordance with correct policy and procedure.”