Physics teacher has been sacked for accidentally shooting a 17-year-old pupil in the leg with an air gun during a classroom experiment.
The popular teacher was trying out a new experiment to measure the acceleration of a pellet as it passed through sheets of paper when the accident occurred. The pellet apparently deflected off a table, hitting 17-year-old AS-level pupil Ben Barlow in the leg.
After the teacher was sacked, the injured boy began a Facebook campaign calling for the school to re-instate the teacher.
Daily Mail reports:
But the boy he injured has begun a Facebook campaign calling for him to be given his job back.
Yesterday, as the Facebook page he set up in support of Mr West passed 2,170 ‘likes’, Ben said a safety pin could have caused him more harm.
He said he decided to study physics because of the 53-year-old teacher’s ability to ‘make the subject come alive’.
About 20 lower-sixth formers at St Peter’s Collegiate, Wolverhampton, volunteered to hold sheets of paper at arms-length over a line of desks, Ben said. He was about three-quarters of the way down the line when he was struck.
‘The bullet travelled through the first ten or 11 sheets, then it must have hit a desk below and cannoned into me,’ he said. ‘It was just a momentary pain, like when you walk into the corner of a table. I was left with just a scratch.’
Following the accident in November, Mr West was ‘extremely concerned and apologetic’ and the experiment was halted.
Ben mentioned the incident to his mother that night, and she spoke to the school.
Mr West was suspended soon afterwards and dismissed last week following a disciplinary hearing. It is understood that he was found guilty of gross misconduct.
Ben said he has written to school governors in protest at Mr West’s dismissal. A source said senior figures at the school were aware that head of science Mr West had sometimes used a pellet gun – which is legal for adults to buy and possess – in experiments.
Yesterday father-of-two Mr West, who lives with wife Marion, 54, in Bridgnorth, Shropshire, said he wanted his job back but refused to comment further for fear of jeopardising his appeal against dismissal.
Friends said the teacher was ‘devastated’ at the loss of his unblemished 20-year career at the school.
But one parent said: ‘I can’t believe a teacher thought it was appropriate to take a gun into a school. Surely there are safer ways to do this experiment than taking a deadly weapon into the classroom?’
Head teacher Adrian Richards said Mr West was sacked after a full investigation.
‘As we are still in the appeal phase of the process, it would be inappropriate to comment any further,’ he added.
Ben said pupils taught by Mr West in 1997 had offered support on his Facebook page, Bring Back Westy 2014.
Pupil Isabella Leadbeater, 17, said: ‘We’re infuriated about this and Mr West has been humiliated.’
Tim Cooper, a former English teacher at St Peter’s, said Mr West was ‘one of the best teachers I’ve ever had the privilege of teaching with’.
