MORE revelations about drug-taking pupils at Commonweal School have come to light after former members of staff have come forward to back up shocking claims made by a teacher.

Last week, a current member of staff called for the school to allow police sniffer dogs to visit the grounds to catch out pupils walking into class high and hiding drugs in their underwear.

Concerns about students smoking drugs before and after school, particularly by the tennis courts, were first made public earlier this month by residents, resulting in undercover police patrols in the Goddard Avenue area.

Now, former members of staff have come forward to commend the teacher, who wishes to remain anonymous, for their frank observations about the problem.

Mike Walker left Commonweal three years ago and believes that while it is a good thing that the issue has come to the public’s attention, action needs to be taken immediately by the school.

“I applaud the teacher who went to the press and highlighted their concerns regarding this issue,” he said.

“They care about the school and the pupil’s safety - I say well done.

“My problem is that I agree that there may well be effective provision of drug education at Commonweal informing pupils of the dangers of taking controlled substances. However, I disagree that this by itself is the panacea to rid a school of this potential cancer.

"Pupils need to be informed via assemblies and parents through the school newsletter where exactly a school stands should any pupil take an illegal drug. This message should be simple and effective – expulsion.

“The strength of a great school is its honesty.

"A great school has a zero tolerance towards drug taking that everyone understands. This shows the school really cares.”

In the last year, only one pupil has been permanently excluded for being caught with drugs in the school grounds and during undercover police patrols earlier this month, a group of pupils were stopped by officers. But on searching their bags, no drugs were found.

Commonweal say work is ongoing with agencies including the police to resolve the problem and they will continue to investigate any concerns raised by nearby residents.

Mike added: “I want them to be more honest and open about what is happening and do this as a sign of strength to reassure everyone at the school.”

Another teacher, who worked at Commonweal for over a decade, said: “There are all sorts of things going on at Commonweal that people, including parents, don’t know about. There is so much smoking and the pupils would even fall asleep in your lessons because they were stoned, had red eyes and were incoherent.

“Something needs to happen and the school needs to let the sniffer dogs in.

“As teachers there you tell someone about your concerns but you feel like it isn’t taken seriously and you have to fight to get someone to listen.”

In a statement sent to parents in response to the Adver’s article last week, Keith Defter, headteacher of Commonweal said he felt it was prudent to explain what solutions they are currently working on.

He added: “Any issues that we are currently dealing with are the same issues faced by any other school in the country.

“We are working incredibly hard with a number of other agencies to resolve this issue of potential drug use.

“It would be wrong to say that this issue wasn’t around 10 or 15 years ago. It has been an issue that all schools are facing and at this minute in time, we seem to be in the spotlight.

“In society as a whole, I think the issue of drug misuse is a big one and we cannot sweep it under the carpet.

"As I said in my statement, we are continuing to work with the local community and police and we had a meeting with a substance misuse group on the back of the coverage to look at potential strategies.

“We take our community responsibilities very seriously but actually it is about us all working together which includes the parents.”