EXCLUSIONS have dropped by two thirds at an East Lancashire school which has piloted a new scheme where troublemakers say sorry.

Burnley super school Sir John Thursby Community College, has been working with the Youth Offending Team over the past year to help improve general pupil behaviour.

Assistant headteacher Helen Campbell said the Writing Wrongs programme had helped year nine students at the Eastern Avenue school prevent and deal with conflicts both inside and outside the school environment.

Developed by the Youth Offending Team’s education officer Andy Winters, pupils used the justice system’s restorative approaches in the school environment.

Restorative justice - which is increasingly being used by police to resolve lower-level crimes - aims to help both criminals and victims come to terms with the impact of an offence.

And after the initial 12 months there has been a 66 per cent drop in the number of internal exclusions, 99.8 per cent of students were confident enough to use restorative approaches during conflicts in school and 85.5 per cent would use the skills outside the school environment.

Writing Wrongs is a multimedia resource pack with six-session that include a range of interactive activities and real-life case studies plus worksheets and a CD-Rom.

The techniques were used to resolve a serious incident involving a group of Year 9 boys at the school.

They wrote letters to the victims and took part in a face-to-face meeting the victims, their families and police which helped them understand the consequences of their actions.

Mrs Campbell said: “The students were able to engage with it immediately and it promoted a lot of discussion.

“Since then the lads have not been involved in anything else of that nature.”

Lesley Parkinson, who is helping to develop the programme, said: “We found there was a need for a resource for teachers who had done restorative practice training and wanted to take that into the classroom.”