http://www.stuff.co.nz/4790729a11.html

Teacher struck off over sex notes to boy

Friday, 12 December 2008

A teacher has been struck off after exchanging explicit sexual messages in a journal with a 13-year-old boy in her class.

The journal was discovered by other pupils in the class and the teacher resigned from the school after she was confronted by the principal, the New Zealand Herald reported.

The teacher has been formally censured by the Teachers’ Council disciplinary tribunal and struck off the register.

The boy penned a “crush note” to his intermediate school teacher, and they had an inappropriate written relationship lasting several weeks last year.

The student, the teacher and school were not publicly identified.

The teacher ran a journal system in her class, where students could communicate anything they wished, the tribunal heard.

The journal had exchanges between the pair, in which the teacher discussed touching the student, showing her g-string and commenting on the size of his penis.

The teacher resigned from the school, undertook counselling, apologised and pointed to her relative professional inexperience.

The teacher engaged in an “entirely inappropriate relationship with the Year 8 (13-year-old) student”, said tribunal chairman Kenneth Johnston.