Teacher struck off for composing pupils’ exam music

By Neil Pooran
Published on 19/03/2013 00:00

A teacher has been struck off after admitting he used his own tunes in a bid to get pupils through their music exams.

David Hall pretended pupils had created their own music for exams when he was in fact the composer.

Mr Hall, a teacher at Arbroath Academy, Angus, submitted his own compositions on behalf of 19 students doing SQA exams.

Today the 53-year-old agreed to be struck off by the General Teaching Council for Scotland (GTCS) after admitting three charges of “acting dishonestly”.

The hearing in Edinburgh was told that the pupils - including Highers candidates - had no idea Mr Hall was trying to cheat.

Of the 19 cases, 16 involved Standard Grade Music, one was Intermediate 2 music, and two were Higher Grade Music.

The compositions were all submitted in May 2012, and in each case was done “without the knowledge of those pupils”, the GTCS charges said.

The compositions were submitted to the school’s Principal Teacher of Expressive Arts to be sent on to the SQA.

It remains unclear how Mr Hall’s dishonesty came to light.

The charges said in each case: “The compositions were written, composed and performed by you, not those pupils.”

The charges continued: “In doing so, you knew that you were acting dishonestly.”

The GTCS hearing was told Mr Hall agreed to be removed from the teaching register.

He will be unable to reapply to be a teacher for a two-year period.

Last March, a teacher was banned from the classroom after he faked students’ standard grade English essays.

Colin Cairns, 51, who taught at Crieff High School in Perth, wrote essays for two pupils despite not teaching them the poems they discussed.

Cairn’s former pupils told the hearing they had not written essays on poems, ‘The Pied Piper’ and ‘The Ruined City’ which were in the fourth-year students’ folios.

And in December last year, the GTCS ruled that a teacher put secret exam information in revision notes for colleagues.

But Sabrina Ferguson escaped punishment because she did not realise the information from the SQA was actual exam content.

The teacher, from Lornshill Academy, Alloa, produced revision notes for the 2010 Graphics Communications exams from Standard Grade to Higher levels.