Exam cheat teacher banned from schools over grade 'fraud'
A disgraced teacher found guilty of fraud and dishonesty has been banned from classrooms.
The indefinite ban was imposed on Edward Cox, who was a key computing and business teacher at Redhill School, Stourbridge, following a Teaching Regulation Agency (TRA) disciplinary hearing.
Cox, aged 33, admitted dishonesty involving pupils’ exam work.
He was said to have submitted one or more pieces of work to an exam board as if it had been produced solely by a pupil when he knew that was not the case.
Cox was said to have submitted grades or marks for one or more pupils to the board which he knew would not reflect the grade or mark the pupil would have received for their own unaided work.
Cox had been employed at Redhill School between September 2015 and February 2018 as the cross-curricular coordinator of ICT and/or head of computing science and/or business.
The incidents took place in the academic year for 2018/2019.
He accepted that his conduct had “lacked integrity and/or was dishonest” and that it amounted to “unacceptable professional conduct” which could bring the teaching profession into disrepute, say the panel findings.
Imposing the ban on behalf of the Education Secretary, Alan Meyrick, chief executive of the TRA, said the findings of misconduct against Cox were “particularly serious as they include a finding of fraud and serious dishonesty.”
He added that the disciplinary panel had found Cox guilty of “misconduct of a serious nature which fell significantly short of the standards expected of the profession”.
The ban is indefinite – but is left open for Cox to seek to have it lifted after five years.
But Mr Meyrick said that if he does seek to have it lifted, he will have to go before another tribunal and satisfy them that he is fit to return to the classroom.
