AN ENGLISH teacher is accused of allowing students to throw chairs around the classroom, draw sexual graffiti on their notebooks and race chairs up and down a corridor.
Gillian Scott is also said to have read a book to a class for three lessons without asking any questions and told a pupil that if they asked for help again they would get a “warning”..
Miss Scott, who worked at the Breadalbane Academy in Aberfeldy, Perthshire, faces being struck off after a colleague raised concerns about her professional competence.
She is set to attend a hearing with the General Teaching Council for Scotland (GTCS) in Edinburgh next week.
Miss Scott, who reportedly now lives overseas, faces two lengthy charges which detail alleged faults in her classroom management and teaching skills.
They relate to a time between 1 December 2010 and 30 November 2013, when Miss Scott was employed at the academy.
One charge claims that: “Your S2 class was out of control on various occasions and pupils were shouting out, throwing objects and throwing chairs.”
Another example provided in the charges alleges: “Four pupils were put out of your class for as much as 15 minutes each and one of the pupils was racing a chair up and down the corridor.”
On 12 December 2012, it was reported to the Depute Headteacher that Miss Scott: “Ignored two boys who were making silly noises throughout the lesson and instead checked the behaviour of a group who were not finished but were on task.”
Another example states that in an observed lesson, “Pupils had inappropriate sexual graffiti on their folders”.
Miss Scott is also accused of telling a pupil to “put their hand down” when they asked for assistance, and saying “If you ask again you’ll get a warning.”
She also allegedly “spent three lessons reading a novel to your S1 class and did not engage the pupils in questioning.”
She has already been represented by her father, James Scott, at a series of procedural hearings with the GTCS.
He believes the complaints against his daughter are linked to an unusual chain of events in 2009 which left pupils waiting for their Higher Prelim results more than a month after they sat the exam.
The series of errors reportedly led to the resignation of two English teachers, but Miss Scott stayed on at the school.
The findings of an investigation into the incident – known as the Jardine Report – ruled that the handling of exam papers was “wholly unacceptable” and concluded that the situation was “shambolic”.
Mr Scott argued that a series of delays in the upcoming case, and an infringement of his daughter’s human rights, was grounds for the case to be dismissed.
But the GTCS panel ruled that there wasn’t any “unreasonable or unjustifiable delay in the proceedings”, and rejected the application.
The hearing is scheduled to start next Monday.
