Kaodi O’Loughlin Campbell

Introduction

Kaodi O’Loughlin Campbell is a Birmingham teacher who was banned from the profession in January 2026 after exchanging private social media messages with a vulnerable former pupil and then lying about it. While on the staff of a Birmingham primary school in early 2023, she gave a former pupil her mobile number, became his friend on Snapchat and told him to delete their messages. Asked about the contact during 2023, she denied it, admitting everything only after screenshots surfaced. A Teaching Regulation Agency panel found the conduct amounted to unacceptable professional conduct including serious dishonesty, and a decision maker acting for the Secretary of State prohibited her from teaching indefinitely.

Background Information

O’Loughlin Campbell qualified as a teacher in 2021. Between September 2021 and May 2022 she worked occasionally as a supply member of staff at Elmwood School, a special secondary school for children with social, emotional and mental health needs; her training had included no secondary or special school work. Pupil A was a pupil at Elmwood, and the two met there. From September 2023 she taught at Ferndale Primary School in Birmingham, which remained her employer when the case was decided. The conduct at the centre of the case ran from January to March 2023, shortly after Pupil A had left Elmwood.

The Controversy or Incident That Led to Their Cancellation

Admitted on the papers after denying to investigators. O’Loughlin Campbell admitted every allegation through a signed statement of agreed facts, and the case was decided without a hearing at her request. It was a regulatory case, not a criminal one. The panel found she acted without malicious intent and that there was no evidence of direct harm to Pupil A, but it found her denials and her delete instructions dishonest.

In January 2023 O’Loughlin Campbell gave Pupil A, then still a child with significant vulnerabilities, her mobile phone number. The two became friends on Snapchat and exchanged messages. On 1 February 2023 she messaged him: “Make sure you delete all the messages from here.” In a further message she told him not to save her number under her name. On 5 March 2023 she asked him to “Add me back on Snap” and then sent a text telling him to “delete these messages”. She also directed him to contact her via social media.

Concerns about potential social media contact between the two were raised in January and again in May 2023. Each time, O’Loughlin Campbell was asked about the matter and did not disclose anything. In October 2023 Pupil A made disclosures, and screenshots of the messages she had sent him from January 2023 emerged, along with a screenshot of her contact details. Multi-agency investigations followed.

On 22 November 2023, the School interviewed her. She said she had not communicated with any pupils from the school after leaving in May 2022 and that her interactions with pupils were “always formal”. When she was shown the 2023 messages, she admitted sending and receiving them.

O’Loughlin Campbell signed a statement of agreed facts on 4 November 2025 admitting all five allegations, and the Teaching Regulation Agency agreed to her request that the case be considered without a hearing; the panel met in private on 22 January 2026. It found the false denials during the investigations and the delete instructions dishonest, concluding she had “attempted to cover up” her conduct, and found that the offence of fraud or serious dishonesty was relevant. It accepted she had been motivated by a desire to support Pupil A but held that there were other proper routes she could and should have taken. It “could envisage no circumstances” in which contact of that nature and type was acceptable, and found her conduct towards “a recent past pupil who had significant vulnerabilities was a breach of professional boundaries”.

Public Reaction and Consequences

No criminal proceedings appear in the decision; the consequences were regulatory. The immediate institutional response was Elmwood’s November 2023 interview, after which the case passed through multi-agency investigations to the Teaching Regulation Agency. The panel recommended a prohibition order with a two-year review period, citing the strong public interest in safeguarding and public confidence where findings involved “a dishonest and self-interested cover up”. Deciding for the Secretary of State, David Oatley placed considerable weight on the seriousness of a teacher developing an inappropriate relationship with a pupil and then dishonestly attempting to cover it up, alongside the panel’s concern at her limited insight and the ongoing risk of repetition. Because the case was considered on the papers in private, the published outcome is the public account of the case. It was published on 5 February 2026.

Current Status

O’Loughlin Campbell is prohibited from teaching indefinitely and cannot teach in any school, sixth form college, relevant youth accommodation or children’s home in England. She may apply for the prohibition order to be set aside, but not until 29 January 2028, two years from the date of the order, at the earliest. This is not an automatic right: if she applies, a panel will meet to consider whether the order should be set aside, and without a successful application she remains barred for life. She also has a right of appeal to the High Court within 28 days of notice of the order. The decision was made by David Oatley on behalf of the Secretary of State on 23 January 2026 and published on 5 February 2026.

Impact on Their Career/Life

The ban closes off a career that was barely under way: O’Loughlin Campbell had qualified in 2021 and had been at Ferndale Primary School only since September 2023. The panel acknowledged her previously good history and the valuable contribution she had to make, and treated her early career and lack of secondary or special school training as mitigation. But it had no sufficient assurance she had remediated her conduct, noting no evidence of any work, training or reflection since 2023 and no real reflection on her dishonesty. Any return would require a successful application to set aside the order after 29 January 2028, with a panel satisfied she had developed full insight into the boundary breach and the dishonesty.

Sources

• Teaching Regulation Agency, “Teacher misconduct panel outcome: Ms Kaodi O’Loughlin Campbell,” published 5 February 2026 — source