Bermuda Regiment Commander Lt. Col. David Burch yesterday confirmed that Warwick Camp had been targeted as a possible school site for disruptive students.

But he said the site was one of several being considered.

"Works and Engineering are involved in the discussions because it's their responsibility to find a location,'' Lt. Col. Burch said. "Warwick Camp is not the only site that the Ministry is looking at.

"It (the plan to set up the school at Warwick Camp) is very much, whilst advanced, still in the discovery stage.'' Education Minister Jerome Dill recently told The Royal Gazette a site for the school had been found and it should be "up and running very shortly''. But he declined to confirm its location.

However, sources said officials from the Education Ministry had visited Warwick Camp and held talks with Regiment officials.

Lt. Col. Burch yesterday confirmed this, but said no definitive decisions had been made.

Asked what he knew about the plans, Lt. Col. Burch said: "I think the plan at the moment is that the Education Ministry are very much leading on this in that it is going to fall under their domain with some involvement during the course of the school day by members of the Regiment.

"But the details of that are not worked out as yet.'' The idea of an alternative school has been endorsed by the Bermuda Union of Teachers, the Association of School Principals, parents, and MPs of all three political parties, including former Education Minister Clarence Terceira who had earmarked the former Woodlands School on Mount Hill, Pembroke for such a school.

But that facility became a school for students with genuine behavioural disorders when Mr. Dill became Education Minister.

Mr. Dill stressed the need to allow alternative programmes to work in schools before setting up an alternative school.

But recent outbreaks of violence in schools, particularly at CedarBridge Academy and at the Hamilton bus depot, forced both Mr. Dill and Premier Pamela Gordon to last week bring the issue of an alternative school to the forefront.

They have also requested a list of names of disruptive students from CedarBridge.

Students on the list, if involved in disturbances after being warned, will be taken out of school and placed in the alternative school until they learn how to act in the regular school environment, they said.

If the students return to regular schools and continue to be disruptive, they will be expelled from the school system entirely, they added.

Yesterday, CedarBridge principal Ernest Payette, through a spokeswoman, said he had no details about the alternative school and he had not yet forwarded a list of disruptive students to the Education Ministry.

Meanwhile, Bermuda Union of Teachers organiser Milton Scott said while he accepted that Warwick Camp could be an option for an alternative schooling programme, more was needed to help Bermuda's disruptive youth.

And he denied Mr. Dill's claims that alternative programmes were already set up in schools.

"I don't know what they intend to provide at the Regiment,'' Sen. Scott said.

"But we're talking about an educational programme, not necessarily a boot camp, a programme run by educators who have the specialised skills to deal with individuals who have a higher propensity toward being disruptive in school.

"An alternative school at Warwick Camp may be one of the options that can be utilised, but they have not got the programmes in our regular schools.''