A SCHOOL governor and student support worker has been jailed for a year to warn other school staff they must resist schoolgirls with "crushes".

David Thomas Scott was 33 when he kissed and cuddled a 15-year-old girl in his car and, immediately after she turned 16, had protected sex with her at his home and at a Manchester hotel, said Abigail Langford, prosecuting at York Crown Court.

She had developed a "crush" on him. For months he had ignored her attempts to engage in conversation via social media.

But eventually he met her away from the York secondary school where she was a pupil and he was both a governor and a member of staff and they started their sexual relationship.

Neither the girl, nor her mother, wanted him to be jailed, said Ms Langford.

Defence solicitor advocate Lee-Anne Robins-Hicks handed in dozens of testimonials from former pupils, their parents and other members of staff, in his support. Many of them had come forward after reading about his case in The Press.

Judge Rodney Jameson QC jailed Scott for 12 months saying he had to lock him up "to indicate the crucial importance for those in roles of responsibility in relation to young people to withstand temptation and not to offend in this way.

"The degree of trust reposed in you was of a very high order."

He said: "Pupils of any school require protection from the crushes they may develop towards teachers at their school."

Scott, of St George's Place, off Tadcaster Road, York, pleaded guilty to three charges of sexual activity with a girl while in a position of trust.

Mrs Robins-Hicks said he had resigned from the school where he had worked for eight years and now worked in a completely different field.

In addition to the jail sentence, Scott was forbidden to have any contact with the girl indefinitely under a sexual harm prevention order and put on the sex offenders' register for ten years.

Ms Langford said Scott started work at the school as a teaching assistant in 2006 and by 2012 had risen to the role of leading student support worker. He had also been elected by fellow staff members as a staff governor and sat on a school development committee.

Mrs Robins-Hicks said Scott was remorseful and regretted his actions.

He had been emotionally vulnerable when he agreed to meet the girl because his marriage was breaking up.

"He made a professional mistake," she said of the initial meeting.