Schools say you just can't beat campus cops scheme

CAMPUS cops have been hailed as a great success in Edinburgh schools – despite a study finding they have had little impact on reducing crime.

A new report commissioned by the Scottish Government on school-based officers across the country found there were "no clear trends" to prove crime rates had fallen.

But it also found they had been successful in tackling bullying, truancy and fighting among pupils.

And those behind the scheme in Edinburgh have defended the value of the officers, saying driving down crime rates was not the key objective.

There are already six schools in the Capital with school link officers – and they have been deemed so successful that it is hoped at least another two will get them before long.

Councillor Marilyne MacLaren, the city's education leader, said: "The school link officers are not coming in with enforcement on their minds.

"Saying that, crimes have been solved in communities because the police officers have known kids who have known those who have done it and the kids have trusted them enough to confide in them about it.

"Also, at the end of the trials at Tynecastle and Boroughmuir, analysts at Lothian and Borders looked at the data because we wanted to make sure that the scheme had value before we expanded it and at that time there was a reduction in crime in the immediate area.

"There have been lots of knock-on effects that we didn't think of at the time we started the trial."

But Cllr MacLaren was keen to stress that the so-called campus cops were not "a soft option".

She added: "Police officers have a certain authority with families and young people and that can be extremely useful in certain circumstances.

"If push comes to shove and youngsters continue to misbehave, they will be charged and that has happened.

As well as tackling important school-based issues such as truancy, the campus cops are also viewed as positive role models for pupils, have acted as mentors and even get involved in programmes such as the Duke of Edinburgh Awards.

At Tynecastle High – which received one of the first link officers in the city – PC Karl Cleghorn has become "part of the brickwork" of the school and gets involved in everything from acting as an intermediary between pupils who have fallen out to refereeing football matches.

PC Cleghorn, who has worked at the school for just over a year, said: "Young people have a bad impression of police and adults and I'm trying to take away those mysteries and build up trust.

"If I have a kid who's been identified to me by my colleagues as having been in trouble on the streets at nights, I can have a word with them in school and see if I can help."

He added that after-school fights which used to break out between pupils from Tynecastle High and other schools on Bruntsfield Links no longer take place since campus cops were introduced.

Tom Rae, headteacher at Tynecastle High – where skills and lifelong learning secretary Keith Brown launched the research findings yesterday – said: "PC Cleghorn can help deal with problems which, in the past, might have just simmered away.

"He is a good role model and mentors some students if they are going through a difficult time.