The multiple impacts of teacher misbehaviour

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the impacts of serious teacher misbehaviour (TMB) in schools from the perspective of headteachers, a largely un-researched area.

Data were collected via the documentary analysis of misconduct cases from the Teaching Agency and semi-structured interviews with five headteachers who had managed serious cases.

The research suggests four primary impacts of serious TMB, affecting other teachers, students, the reputation of the school and headteachers themselves. The paper concludes by suggesting a fifth impact affecting public trust in the teaching profession.

Although rare, serious TMB can be highly damaging. Furthermore, the findings suggest that it is almost impossible to predict and so this paper suggests a “map” of the impacts helping headteachers to manage and contain it when/if the worst does happen.

Empirical studies of the impacts of serious organisational behaviour are scarce; empirical studies of serious organisational behaviour in schools are non-existent and so this paper addresses that gap.