Teacher arrested for attempted murder

[Bottomofthebarrel]

This week a teacher at my DD’s secondary school was arrested for attempted murder. He stabbed a woman in the head and neck in broad daylight, and I believe he was only unsuccessful in killing her because other people intervened. She is in a critical condition in hospital, so he could be looking at a murder charge. This has all been in the news, including the BBC.

This man was teaching my own child until very recently. She was given an after school detention by him for being very slightly late to his lesson, and the detention was just him and her sat in a room. That sends shivers down my spine now. I can’t get the whole thing out of my head.

This must be so disturbing for all the kids at the school. I feel that the school are potentially going to struggle more with behaviour control from now on - this man was employed as one of their role models so I can’t help but feel they’ve lost the moral high ground. Not to mention the effect on those who are in their exam years and are now minus a subject teacher.

How the fuck does someone like that become a teacher? I must say in the last 9 years since my DC started secondary, I’ve come across a few - all of them male - teachers who have got my back up and seem to be definite ‘power tripping know it all’ types, and not particularly bright to boot. There’s another male teacher in another local school who was in the news, having to pay £200,000 damages to his neighbour after a childish bullying campaign which went on for years.

Is this the best we can do? I get teaching isn’t the most attractive profession, but it actually terrifies me that these people are supposed to be guiding and leading our children, sometimes on a one to one basis. My worry is that with the current shortage of teachers, and desperation to fill vacancies, the standards are going to sink even lower.

This isn’t a general teacher bashing thread, there are many truly wonderful ones out there, and I know it’s an incredibly difficult job. Just feeling very shaken by what has happened this week. My DD really didn’t like this man and I assumed it was her being a stroppy teen, now I feel awful for not taking her seriously.

Hmm. The second paragraph seems to contradict the first

I worked very closely with a man arrested and said to prison for life for murdering his gf . Shocked as he was the most unlikely person ever to kill anyone, or so I thought.

Can't say I've ever thought he might have killed me. People do sadly kill people out of rage/jealousy. He was highly unlikely to have been in a rage with, or jealous of, your daughter. Most likely to be a girlfriend/ex girlfriend. That's why I'd hold your worries for ensuring your daughter doesn't end up dating some pyscho - not worry about what could have happened in a detention.

I think people that carry out murder are often mentally unstable and there has often been a decline that has somehow gone unnoticed. I don’t think it will affect the school it didn’t happen there. I haven’t read the report but I’m guessing it was a domestic incident. Most women are harmed by men they know. I would think his colleagues are equally shocked.

Agreed. But the very fact of walking away and leaving your child with another adult demonstrates/ demands a certain level of trust.
We can’t learn, socialise, develop emotionally without trusting others.
My point was that incidents like the one described by the OP undermine trust and can have a negative effect ( which I think has been amply demonstrated on this thread)

I was speaking in general terms. The parents of my pupils are very supportive. I teach in a school where there is generally a good level of respect, trust and good communication between parents, pupils and the school. That is not always the case. Your attitude towards school seems quite negative so I get the impression you would not be a supportive parent. I don’t know you so maybe you’re incredibly supportive in real life.

Every profession will have people employed in them who are less than desirable and who do wrong, that is because human beings are unpredictable and fallible or just plain bad. Cast your mind back to all the endless horrors we are hearing about the Met police and remember that Harold Shipman was a GP. Sadly there will always be hideous breaches of trust and criminal acts but they are very much in the minority and while they are of course deeply shocking they are not the norm

not contradictory, illustrative of the role of teachers. As parents we place trust in teacher to be responsible,capeable,safe. The nature of the job is that the adult has power & authority and we are required to trust their practice and judgment. some jobs have authority & power eg police, health,teaching

FFS @Newchapterbeckons!

You're not even reading the posts you're pouring scorn on!

@MotherofChaosandDestruction was doing the opposite of using mental health as an excuse!

Oh, my days 🙄

I am a parent with two children at the perpetrators school.

At the moment all we know is that the victim is pregnant, in a critical condition and the perpetrator has been charged with attempted murder.

I can make a more general comment however about 'people in authority' which has clearly been a major issue in The Police recently and that is about both Vetting, and more importantly management once people are appointed. To borrow a phrase from a former colleague 'managements DUTY to manage'

This is a very concerning example

https://www.edp24.co.uk/news/24148479.norfolk-hit-and-run-crash-officer-suffered-previous-amnesia/

If I was to look at a particular issue with Education, indeed other public services it is that responsibility has been fragmented and in the case of schools the job of 'managing the manager' has been left to Boards of Governors who often lack the skill, assertiveness and powers to hold school management to account.

My point, is as you know, that there is no way of knowing who will turn out to be a murderer regardless of their profession and that sweeping statements attacking male teachers doesn't help anyone. How does one carry out sufficient vetting to determine future, unknown risks, if there's no previous behaviour to indicate same? It's impossible and it's impossible to safeguard against everything?

There's also research on the benefits of having both male & female teachers and I hate that some men are wary of getting into traditionally female professional because if such generalisation.

I'm not sarcastic or acerbic (both of which have the same meaning btw) about the murder of babies. I am taking about full sex bans in certain professionals which is highly ridiculous.

I actually disagree with most of the teachers on this thread and I am one and have been for over 20 years.

I think there are links with the way the police and teaching operates and parallels can and should be drawn as both professions are public serving.

Teaching as a profession in lots of areas has become extremely toxic. Bullying within staff is common as is closing ranks when something happens to someone in the fold. People who may stick their head above the parapet or whistle blow may be placed on capability. Particularly in academies when ceos are paid vast sums of money and there is a high number of managers/middle management. Fear is generated from ofsted and trickles down.

It may be that that staff member was an exemplary member of staff and hid his true colours well. Or he could have been one of those types of characters I was talking about earlier in my post. If it is the latter, that needs investigating.

Horrible people are drawn to positions where they can exploit vulnerable people. It's important that any incident is thoroughly investigated, not just dismissed as one bad egg. I think the NHS is probably another similar profession which I'd expect the same rigor to be applied.

I understand why you're alarmed op, it's probably made you question the culture of the school. It's unsettling when things happen so close to home.

In case people reading this think I'm a disgruntled teacher, I work in a wonderful school and love my job but I have also seen, heard and have experience of the other places. To pretend they don't exist does our children and other staff caught up in it a terrible disservice. I'll save the rant about our broken education system for another day though!

I am quiet in real life and so are my children. The teachers tell me my son is a quiet respectful boy but when he is stuck he says nothing. I do encourage him to ask for help.

My gripe is from 11 years ago and I should get over it. I haven't met a teacher as bad as this one. I was in a meeting with my daughters teacher I presented work that she completed with a tutor she scrolled through it and her response was she can't do that BUT it's her handwriting. Since then I have kept my guard up. We moved her to another school and she improved.

I really don’t think anyone would think this is acceptable just because he’s a teacher 🙄. Like seriously, who is going to be thinking ‘it must be ok to stab your girlfriend because Mr Jones did it and he was a teacher so it must be ok’.

Wow, the responses!

To make a few things clear:

1. I do not universally hate teachers. I have come across a few bad apples, who have all happened to be male. Including my ex partner who was a teacher, was incredibly arrogant and abusive towards me and my DC, had some kind of god complex, and I have no doubt was attracted to the profession because it made him feel powerful and superior.

2. I don’t blame the school in any way, it would be impossible for any of us to say whether his behaviour in school was ever a cause for concern, and if it was whether this was addressed. And due to employment laws whether they were able to do anything about borderline ‘not ok’ behaviour, if any was witnessed. When does ‘strict’ become ‘unfair’ or ‘controlling’? It’s a fine line, but things don’t tend to happen in a vacuum. We are not privy to any of this information. The staff must all be reeling from this, it’s awful for them (and of course for the victim, which goes without saying).

3. I realise that teachers are humans and none of us as humans are perfect. But I think it’s understandable to be shaken that this man was in a position of trust, acting in loco parentis, and committed such a crime.

4. of course teachers aren’t the only role models, parents and other adult figures are too. However they ARE role models - some families don’t have a father figure and male teachers may be the only adult male role models they have.

I'd bloody hope by the time they've got to teenage years that they've figured out that attempting to murder someone is a Bad Thing.

Or are you suggesting that most young adults need to be spoon fed basic morals?

Of course the school hasn't lost the moral high ground. If anything their reaction will demonstrate how truly awful this crime is and maybe bring home the truth to teens about male violence against women.

2 women a week are murdered by their partners or former partners in the U.K. stands to reason that one of them would be a teacher one day.

I'm not clear what your posting of information about PC Karl Warren has got to do with Boards of Governors at schools?

You never know, behaviour might improve in the school. Behave yourself or Mr so and so might try to kill you 🤷🏻‍♀️

I am being sarcastic in response to the ludicrous suggestion that a school can ‘lose a moral high ground.’

Ok, well hopefully she won't follow his example and start stabbing people. Fingers crossed!🤞

I don't get your worries here. All adults in professions where they care for children need to be stringently vetted, the police need to do this far better too Beyond that, it isn't possible to control whether they turn out to be murdering types, Dennis Neilson was a nice civil servant, and his colleagues couldn't believe it when he was accused and then confessed.

I agree vetting is needed, anything abusive or unacceptable needs reporting within the systems at school, such as teachers abusing their power or unacceptable language/behaviour, as part of a whole set of systems around keeping children and teens safe (including from each other).

But this won't knock onto discipline in the school precisely because it's such an unusual event.

As for role models, the sooner young people realise that sports people and TV stars and even their teachers are people and not ideal humans, the better. This is a horrible way to learn this, but it's a good life lesson. Footballers do bad things, politicians do bad things, even people we know like vicars or teachers or sports coaches do bad things, and it's good for them to be alert to this and to talk openly with parents.

Well I'd be very shocked by that.

I feel that the school are potentially going to struggle more with behaviour control from now on - this man was employed as one of their role models so I can’t help but feel they’ve lost the moral high ground.

You're making no sense. Schools can't predict which of their employees will do something crazy in the future. His unpredictable behaviour does not reflect on them or the teaching profession as a whole.

I suspect this is just another anti-teacher thread.

Bad man does a bad thing. I haven’t read the story but how would his behaviour affect teenagers’ behaviour in a school he ‘used’ to work it? Are you saying the teenagers will use it as an excuse / reason to mess about? That’s doesn’t make any sense whatsoever. There are arseholes and dangerous people in every line of work. Some are just better at hiding it.

From what I understand both the accused and the victim were both teachers, the man at Frome College and the woman at a school in Bath.

The relationship ended, he couldn't accept it, so he tried to kill her.

I feel like I am reading a different thread to the one here. Such hyperbole. ‘Shouted down’. ‘Braying bunch of teachers’. ‘Silenced’ !!

Its is just a normal MN discussion.

Course it’s a shocking event. Another disgusting aggressive man attacking women. The OP was about whether the secondary school kids would see it a signal that they could misbehave as their role model was a potential murderer. Many of us who know teens disagreed. It was a strange OP.

Nobody is dismissing an attempted murder 🙄