Teacher who flirted with sixth form pupil spared being struck off

Female physics teacher who was fired for flirting with a sixth form pupil and told him he’d get a ‘big award’ if he got into Cambridge University is spared being struck off

• Teacher told student he could ask her ‘for a big reward’ if he got into Cambridge 
• Qingqing Duan asked if he ‘saw her as a teacher, girlfriend, friend or soulmate’
• Boy, known as Pupil A’s parents contacted the school expressing concern
• The physics teacher at Brentwood School was fired but spared being struck off 

A female physics teacher who was fired for flirting with a sixth form pupil and told him he would get a ‘big reward’ if he got into Cambridge University is spared being struck off. 

Newly qualified Ms Qingqing Duan emailed the boy into the night and early morning while working at Brentwood School in Essex.

She slipped the student, referred to only as Pupil A, a handwritten note with her phone number and messaged him that he was ‘sweet’ and was her friend outside work, adding: ‘You might be my first student who goes to Cambridge [smile face emoji]. You can ask me for a big award if you make it.’

A misconduct hearing was told she also gave Pupil A personal information, including about a crush she had on a teacher and told him not to share it.

Qingping Duan was a newly qualified physics teacher at Brentwood School in Essex (pictured)

She asked if Pupil A ‘saw her as a teacher, girlfriend, friend or soulmate’ and told him that she would give him a gift if he obtained a grade 9.

She chatted with Pupil A outside the classroom about him ‘having a crush on her’ and, apparently concerned about the note, warned him: ‘Don’t do anything silly if you want to be friends – and destroy the letter.’

Ms Duan was hired as a newly qualified teacher of physics at the school from September 2020 until May 2021, when her bosses received an email from Pupil A’s parents expressing concerns.

A meeting was held with Pupil A’s parents. Ms Duan was suspended and sacked after a disciplinary hearing later that month.

The teacher was fired form her 

At the misconduct hearing she admitted the allegations as well as failing to maintain appropriate professional boundaries with sixth form students by cuddling them prior to an exam.

But she avoided a prohibition order after Neil Hillman, who chaired the Teaching Regulation Agency hearing in Coventry, underlined: ‘The panel also had regard to Ms Duan’s remorse for the incidents and considered she had shown a level of insight into her shortcomings as a teacher, notably her failure to fully understand or appreciate safeguarding issues and professional boundaries, as well as the need to improve her behaviour management.

‘This was demonstrated by the fact that, following her dismissal, Ms Duan had voluntarily undertaken additional safeguarding training.’

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