A 16-year-old boy who was registering as a student at Canyon Springs High School was arrested Friday for bringing a loaded .25-caliber handgun to the campus.

Principal Ronan Matthew used the incident at his school as an example of why the school needs walk-through metal detectors.

Matthew made a similar request late last year, but it was rejected by Clark County School District officials, who said they needed to study the machines' effectiveness before allowing them at traditional high schools.

If Matthew's request had been granted, Canyon Springs would have become the first traditional high school in the district to use walk-through metal detectors during school hours. "This more than proves my point," Matthew said. "There is absolutely no doubt in my mind that metal detectors are a deterrent."

School district police Capt. James Ketsaa said an anonymous tip led to the teenager being arrested about 9 a.m. The teen was charged with carrying a concealed weapon, possession of a dangerous weapon on school property and resisting arrest. He was taken to the Clark County Juvenile Detention Center. Officials refused to identify him because he is a minor.

Ketsaa said he was baffled as to why a student ever would bring a gun to school, let alone while he was registering for classes. "That's not normal for a student at any school, especially for a person at his first day of school," he said.

The incident marked the second time in two days that a student was arrested with a firearm on local school property. A 10th-grader was arrested after school let out Thursday for having an unloaded, small-caliber weapon with him in the parking lot of Mojave High School, Ketsaa said. He said he didn't know what school the student attended.

Matthew said Friday's incident could have escalated because the teen reached in his pocket for the gun after a school police officer informed him that he would be searched. Matthew said the student was restrained by the police officer and two administrators who had to battle the student to the ground.

Friday was the first time this school year that any students had been arrested for carrying a gun at the school on East Alexander Road and North Fifth Street. But one incident suggests that a student brought an undetected gun to school, Matthew said.

On Sept. 21, a 17-year-old Canyon Springs student shot at a bus carrying fellow Canyon Springs students. Bullets struck the back of the bus, but no one was injured.

School district Police Chief Hector Garcia said the school system is studying the effectiveness of metal detectors at other large school districts such as New York and Chicago. From the studies he has seen so far, Garcia said, the machines aren't a big factor in reducing school violence.

The Clark County School District is the fifth-largest in the nation and one of its fastest growing, with almost 303,000 students.

Matthew rebuffed the notion that metal detectors need to be studied further. "Someone is going to be killed while they are sitting on their hands doing research," he said.

Garcia said large-scale implementation of metal detectors at traditional high schools would require School Board approval. Walk-through metal detectors cost between $2,200 and $2,500 apiece. Hand-held detectors range from $150 to $175. The district has 41 traditional high schools.

Six of the district's alternative schools use hand-held metal detectors during the school day, while two other alternative schools use walk-through metal detectors.

Garcia said a time line has not been established for when district officials will determine whether to allow walk-through metal detectors at traditional high schools.

School Board member Carolyn Edwards said she is not philosophically opposed to having metal detectors at high schools during school hours but said school violence hasn't reached the point where metal detectors are needed.

Edwards said Friday's incident should not lead to a knee-jerk reaction to push for metal detectors. "The important thing is they caught him," she said, referring to the teenage gunman. "As things escalate, certainly we'll have to consider measures we don't have in place. I don't think we're at that point yet."

Nineteen firearms and 14 BB guns have been confiscated from school district property this school year, police said.