A FORMER Basingstoke teacher with a ‘long and unblemished career’ has avoided being banned from the profession despite admitting to forming an inappropriate friendship with a student.

David Gillon was a maths teacher and a form tutor at Bishop Challenor Catholic Secondary School, in St Michael’s Road, when he began emailing and messaging a student which amounted to ‘unacceptable professional conduct’.

On July 20, 2020, the school received a complaint about Mr Gillon, stating that he had been sending emails and text messages to the student from his personal email address and mobile phone number.

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Teaching Regulation Agency professional conduct panel on October 16, was told that in or around February 2020, the student, who was being bullied, spoke to Mr Gillon, for the first time, about how he was feeling. This led to further discussions after lessons, which evolved into exchanging emails on Mr Gillon’s work email and the student’s personal email.

“Mr Gillon subsequently stopped using his school email account and used a personal email address to exchange emails with Pupil A,” a report into the misconduct said.

“The first email sent by Mr Gillon from his personal account occurred on 22 March 2020, which he accepted was contrary to the school's requirements and policies.”

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Within this email, Mr Gillon gave the student his personal mobile telephone number. Between 22 March 2020 and 10 July 2020, he sent 451 text messages, over the span of 69 text conversations, to the student from his personal mobile phone. On four occasions, Mr Gillon added an ‘x’, noting a kiss, to his message.

The hearing was told that on July 8, 2020, Mr Gillon sent a message to the student, saying: “Let’s see if we can find a time to have a chat in a park or somewhere sometime when the weather isn’t quite so awful (smiling face emoji)."

He also sent: "Our term actually ends next Friday which will mean the end of supporting home learning – so sometime after that I should be able to fit with when you’re free to – and the weather (smiling face with sunglasses emoji)".

A report into the hearing said: “There was no educational purpose or requirement to meet with Pupil A in July 2020. He had not been requested to visit Pupil A by the school, nor did he inform the school of his proposal to meet Pupil A. The purpose of the proposed meeting was social, which was agreed to be unprofessional.”  

Within the text messages, Mr Gillon invited the student to treat the exchange of communication, "as a conversation with a friend, not a tutor".

Mr Gillon admitted all of the allegations and that his actions amounted to unacceptable professional conduct and conduct that may bring the profession into disrepute. The panel came to the same conclusion but deemed that this was an isolated incident and his actions were, “whilst highly inappropriate, misconceived and not malicious”.

Its conclusion said: “Having very carefully taken account of the public interest considerations Mr Gillon's proven conduct gave rise to, the panel considered that the publication of the adverse findings it has made would be sufficient to send an appropriate message as to the standards of behaviour that were acceptable."

Mr Gillon resigned from the school in on December 8, 2020, and has now retired. The report said he was offering private tuition and “was presently unclear as to whether he would seek to return to the classroom and in what capacity”.