As part of their BTEC Applied Science qualification, the Sixth Form learners at Brynllywarch Hall School in Kerry have been working on a unit “Investigating Crime Scene Evidence”.

Dr Sharlene Watkins; Senior Forensic Officer for Dyfed Powys Police, has been working closely with Stephen Cox – Teacher, to ensure coverage of the assessment criteria, as well as created a simulated crime scene to engage learners with Science in a real-life context. She visited the school to deliver a presentation to learners covering all aspects of the course, and have a Q&A session with the learners, followed by a practical session to conduct experiments including collect finger prints, developing shoe prints, examine and identify tool marks, and testing for blood and collecting swobs for DNA analysis using sterilised horse blood.

Following the hands-on session, the learners were called in pairs to the school’s meeting room which had been made over as a simulated crime scene of an aggravated burglary, where the headteacher Mr Randel was attacked to steal money set aside for the school’s trip to Cambodia in February. The task was part of the learner’s final assessment under the title “Mystery in the Meeting Room. The learners had access to genuine resources used by Dyfed Powys Police and after completing a crime scene sketch they placed yellow evidence markers and photographed the evidence before following the real Police procedures to confidently recover the evidence demonstrate their forensic science skills.

The learners then had to use the evidence they collected to solve the crime having eliminated the evidence of the victim to make a hypothesis naming the attacker.

Mr Cox said “I am very proud of the learner’s today, they really enjoyed and engaged well with the work, and they all solved the crime!”, he went on to say “I would also like to thank Dyfed Police and especially Dr Watkins for their help and support on this initiative, the staff and learners have had lots of fun whilst learning”.

In the afternoon, Dr Watkins went to the school’s KS2 classes for those younger learners to also have some fun forensic science experiments, with certificates to mark the special occasion.