Carolyn Akers

Introduction

Carolyn Akers is a former supply science teacher who was prohibited from teaching indefinitely after admitting that, during lessons at Budmouth Academy in Weymouth, she told a pupil that “if you took him outside and shot him, no one would miss him”, told the same child he “will be transgender when he is older”, hit him on the head with a booklet and called him “stupid” and “wet” — and then, while applying for a new teaching job, concealed two safeguarding investigations and lied about why she had left. A Teaching Regulation Agency professional conduct panel found every allegation proven on her admissions, and decision maker David Oatley imposed a prohibition order with immediate effect on 24 October 2025, with a four-year review period.

Background Information

Akers worked at Budmouth Academy in Weymouth, Dorset as a supply science teacher, engaged through the agency Prospero Teaching. The misconduct occurred between June 2019 and February 2020 and targeted one pupil, referred to in the proceedings as Pupil A. The academy investigated after a parental complaint, interviewing pupils and recording a summary of their accounts. This was not Akers’s first referral: she had previously been referred to the Local Authority Designated Officer for similar conduct at Queen Elizabeth’s School in 2018, which resulted in her dismissal by that school. In February 2020 she applied for a role at King Arthur’s School while a fresh LADO investigation arising from her Budmouth role was still underway.

The Controversy or Incident That Led to Their Cancellation

Admitted misconduct, dishonesty found. Akers signed a statement of agreed facts admitting all allegations, including dishonesty under the two-stage test from Ivey v Genting Casinos. The case was decided without a hearing on her admissions; the findings below are adjudicated facts, not contested claims.

The panel found proved that Akers told Pupil A in class that if you took him outside and shot him, no one would miss him; that she commented the boy “will be transgender when he is older”; that she hit him on the head with a booklet — she admitted the contact, which pupils described as a booklet and which caused no injury — and that she called him “stupid” and/or “wet”. The panel also found that during her February 2020 recruitment with King Arthur’s School she failed to disclose either the previous 2018 LADO investigation or the ongoing one, answered dishonestly about her status, and gave a false reason for leaving Budmouth — saying she left to secure a permanent position elsewhere rather than because of a misconduct allegation. Her application form did answer “yes” to the question of whether she was subject to any DfE conditions or prohibitions, but without the required detail, and an email from the school recorded that she made no mention of any safeguarding concern and “lied about her current status”. She admitted that this conduct was dishonest, and the panel found allegation 3 — dishonesty — proved.

The panel treated the repetition as decisive: she had already been dismissed after a LADO referral for similar conduct, and the behaviours were repeated at Budmouth. It found a strong public interest in the safeguarding and wellbeing of pupils, public confidence, and proper standards, noted there was “evidence that the teacher’s actions were deliberate”, that she was not acting under duress, and that she provided no references or testimonials and no information as to her insight or remorse. Prohibition, it concluded, was “both proportionate and appropriate”.

Public Reaction and Consequences

The decision was published by the TRA on GOV.UK, where the case record names her, her agency employer and the school. The panel’s reasoning stressed that teachers are expected to maintain “an exemplary level of integrity and ethical standards at all times”, and that publication of adverse findings alone would “unacceptably compromise the public interest considerations present in this case”. The order bars her from teaching in any school, sixth-form college, relevant youth accommodation or children’s home in England. Neither Akers nor the schools involved issued any public statement beyond the adjudication itself; the case generated no reported comment from Budmouth Academy, King Arthur’s School or Prospero Teaching after publication.

Current Status

Akers is prohibited from teaching indefinitely, with immediate effect from 24 October 2025, and may apply to have the order set aside no earlier than four years after the prohibition took effect — 30 October 2029 at the earliest, and an application is not an automatic right; a fresh panel would decide whether the ban should be lifted. She has a right of appeal to the High Court within 28 days of notice of the order, which has not been reported as exercised. Without a successful application she remains barred from the profession for life.

Impact on Their Career/Life

The prohibition order ended a teaching career that had already survived one dismissal: after the 2018 LADO referral and dismissal from Queen Elizabeth’s School, Akers returned to classrooms through a supply agency and repeated substantially the same conduct toward a child, then lied her way through a safer-recruitment process at another school. The four-year review period reflects the panel’s finding of “serious dishonesty” — deliberate concealment of investigations from an employer — combined with physical contact with a pupil on each occasion. Her case now stands in the public TRA record as the enforcement example for supply teachers: agency engagement does not insulate classroom conduct from a national ban, and dishonesty toward a recruiting school converts a classroom misconduct case into an integrity bar.

Sources

• Teaching Regulation Agency (GOV.UK), “Teacher misconduct panel outcome: Mrs Carolyn Akers,” Oct 24, 2025 — source