John Dadds

Introduction

John Dadds was a teacher of ICT and geography at The Compass Learning Centre, a pupil referral unit in Weymouth, from September 2013 until an incident on 2 May 2019 in which he attempted to physically restrain a pupil during an ICT lesson. The pupil had threatened to smash his laptop and pushed it towards him after Dadds blocked the computer games he had allowed the class to play; the attempted hold failed, Dadds fell against a desk, and the pupil kicked out. CCTV of the episode showed no malice but, in the panel’s later finding, more force than was needed and a situation he had lost control of. He denied the allegations, gave evidence and showed the panel the footage himself — and lost. On 18 October 2022 decision maker John Knowles banned him from teaching for two years before any review, citing the panel’s view that the misconduct sat at the lower end of the spectrum but was aggravated by his lack of insight.

Background Information

The Compass Learning Centre served pupils excluded from mainstream school, and Pupil A had arrived with a history serious enough that the unit was in the early stages of creating an individual education, behaviour, care and health plan for him — plans of that kind being implemented, a senior colleague explained, only after three serious behavioural incidents. The plan specifically advised avoiding consequence-reminders with Pupil A. On the day, Dadds’s IT equipment was malfunctioning, so he let the class play computer games until the lesson could begin; when he used software to block the games, Pupil A reacted with the threat and the push. Dadds, believing the pupil posed an immediate risk to others and to equipment, attempted a Team Teach “T Wrap” restraint hold. The technique failed, he fell against a desk, and the pupil kicked him. A senior colleague who reviewed the CCTV found no legal or ethical basis for the restraint as attempted, did not accept it was a proper T Wrap, and was concerned by its duration and aimlessness. The panel also heard that between 2016 and 2017 Dadds had received four separate pieces of informal advice from senior staff about appropriate physical contact with pupils — on 12 May 2016, 2 February 2017, 4 October 2017 and 12 October 2017.

The Controversy or Incident That Led to Their Cancellation

A failed restraint in a PRU classroom — no malice on CCTV, but force beyond what was needed, after four earlier advices about physical contact. Contested case, both allegations proved, two-year review ban.

The legal framework was not in doubt: section 93(1) of the Education and Inspections Act 2006 permits teachers to use “such force as is reasonable in the circumstances” to prevent injury or damage, and the Department for Education’s 2013 guidance is explicit — “Reasonable in the circumstances means using no more force than is needed” — with force a last resort. Viewing the CCTV, the panel concluded that Dadds lost control of the situation and made a poor decision — the force was not proportionate, there was more force than was needed, and a verbal warning or a call for help should have come first. The second allegation, that this happened despite previous advice, was proved by the four documented informal discussions, which Dadds acknowledged receiving; his answer that the advice had been given to protect him rather than pupils did not persuade the panel, which was concerned he had neither taken the advice on board nor appreciated that it served safeguarding on both sides. He was represented, gave sworn evidence, and played the footage to the panel himself — a contested case decided on the evidence rather than on admissions.

Public Reaction and Consequences

The panel’s seriousness assessment was calibrated rather than maximal: it placed the misconduct at the lower end of the spectrum of serious misconduct, recognising a frightened teacher’s split-second response to a threatened laptop and a volatile pupil, with no finding of malice anywhere in the footage. What tipped the outcome was reflection — the panel found Dadds demonstrated a lack of insight into his actions, was not satisfied by his evidence about how he would handle a similar situation in future, and concluded he had not properly reflected on or taken responsibility for his behaviour, nor grasped why he should have used de-escalation before physical contact. It recommended prohibition with a two-year review period, weighing the lower-end finding against the insight deficit. Knowles adopted the recommendation, writing that the panel had deemed the misconduct lower-end but that the lack of insight meant “there is some risk of the repetition of this behaviour, and this puts at risk the future wellbeing of pupils”, to which he gave considerable weight.

Current Status

Dadds is prohibited from teaching indefinitely and cannot teach in any school, sixth form college, relevant youth accommodation or children’s home in England. Unlike the regulator’s no-review orders, his carries a review window: he may apply for the prohibition to be set aside from 21 October 2024, two years after the order, though an application guarantees a hearing, not a result — without a successful application the ban stands. The order takes effect on service, with a right of appeal to the High Court within 28 days; the determination is dated 10 October 2022. The case was heard over multiple days across 2022, including an adjourned segment in which Dadds read out a prepared statement and showed the CCTV rather than following the normal procedure for serving evidence — a discretion the panel allowed in his favour. Whether he applied after October 2024 is not addressed in the decision.

Impact on Their Career/Life

The case maps the narrow line teachers in behaviour units walk: the same legislation that authorises restraint punishes the version of it that is more than needed, and the difference is judged after the fact from a fixed camera. Dadds’s initial judgment call — allowing computer games to bridge an equipment failure — set the conditions: the block that followed was, to a pupil whose plan warned against exactly this kind of consequence-reminder, a provocation. The four earlier advices about physical contact, none formal and none on his record, nonetheless counted against him, showing that informal guidance accumulates into the record a panel later reads. The two-year review period reflects the panel’s own calibration — the lower-end finding earned a path back that sexual or violent findings never receive — while the insight finding shows the other lever: a teacher who disputes rather than reflects keeps the door open for less time than one who engages. For PRUs, the case is a reminder that a behaviour plan’s counterintuitive instructions, like avoiding consequence-reminders with a volatile pupil, are written from incident history.

Sources

• Dept for Education, “Teacher misconduct panel outcome: Mr John Dadds” — source