In December 2020, in the case of CAC v Teacher F, the New Zealand Disciplinary Tribunal deregistered a teacher for having an inappropriate relationship with a former student, whom he had married. The teacher had taught his future wife as a student at primary school in years 7 and 8, when she was aged 11 to 13. He was 34 years older. She was a student who received extra learning support.

Several years after leaving primary school, but while she was still in high school, the now former student – together with another friend – began to visit the teacher regularly, including at his school and his home. They also went to the movies, the beach, and the city together. At the time, the primary school’s principal warned the teacher about the need to observe professional boundaries when former students visited. The former student’s parents found out that the former student and teacher were in a relationship when she was 18, and sent her to Australia in an attempt to end the relationship. The teacher followed her there. After their return, the teacher and the former student married when she was 20 and remain married.

The Tribunal found that the teacher had embarked on a deliberate and consistent pattern of behaviour with a vulnerable young woman. It found that the relationship remained inherently unequal within their marriage, and that the teacher’s behaviour over a period of years was at the most extreme end of serious misconduct, which warranted deregistration. However, the Tribunal found that there was insufficient evidence to prove that the teacher had engaged in any serious misconduct while his future wife was a student at his (primary) school.

Whether or not a teacher can ever pursue a romantic or intimate relationship with a former student who is now an adult is a vexed question. There is not, and probably cannot be, a blanket prohibition; rather, whether a relationship with a former student is inappropriate depends on the context and the facts of each case. However, guidance is available about the kinds of contexts and situations that should ring alarm bells for schools and their staff.

Guidance from the States and Territories

In South Australia, the Department for Education, the Association of Independent Schools of South Australia and Catholic Education South Australia have jointly developed Protective practices for staff in their interactions with children and young people – Guidelines for staff working or volunteering in education or care settings (Protective Practices). Protective Practices includes advice about professional boundaries and, in its section on sexual relationships between legally consenting adults, advises school staff that:

“…where a relationship develops with an ex-student, their employer is entitled to consider whether their actions suggest an abuse of their position as a staff member. Where there is a reasonable belief that the emotional intimacy of the relationship developed while the staff-student relationship existed, a judgment that abuse of their position has occurred is likely. What is significant in staff-student relationships are the differences in authority and power held by the staff member and levels of trust held by the student. These differences do not suddenly disappear at a specific point in time. They linger as an imbalance between the two individuals and as a potential impediment to their capacity to make decisions in their own and others’ best interests.”

Protective Practices sets out a number of factors that can inform whether a relationship between a staff member and a former student who is now an adult is inappropriate, including:

• the length of time that has passed between when the person was a student and the commencement of the relationship
• the age difference between the staff member and the ex-student
• the developmental capacity of the ex-student
• the vulnerability of the ex-student
• evidence of the nature of the relationship while the staff-student relationship existed
• any other concerns or allegations about the staff member’s conduct.

The Queensland College of Teacher’s Professional Boundaries – a Guideline for Queensland Teachers, the Northern Territory Teacher Registration Board’s Managing Professional Boundaries: Guidelines for Teachers, and the Teachers Registration Board of Tasmania’s Professional Boundaries – Guidelines for Tasmanian Teachers each contain a similar list.

Looking at the list above, it is easy to see how the New Zealand teacher’s relationship with his former student was considered to fall outside professional boundaries. Indeed, the Northern Territory version of this list was considered directly by the Tribunal in the New Zealand case.

In Western Australia, the Teacher Registration Board of Western Australia has produced Teacher-Student Professional Boundaries: a Resource for WA Teachers (the Resource), which is designed to assist teachers to meet the Professional Standards for Teachers in Western Australia. Although not as prescriptive as other jurisdictions guidelines, in its section on relationships with former students, the Resource recognises that, although a relationship with a former student who is now an adult may be lawful, it:

“...may still generate concerns that a teacher may previously have abused their position or crossed professional boundaries by using their position as a teacher to prepare a student for a relationship.”

The Resource advises teachers to ensure that their relationships with students are strictly professional and do not breach boundaries. By doing so, it says, a teacher who subsequently forms a relationship with a former student who is now an adult will be less likely to come under scrutiny, provided that considerable time has passed between the time when the student was at the school and the commencement of the relationship.

The New Zealand teacher would have been in difficulty here too. Although the Tribunal ultimately found that there was insufficient evidence that the teacher had engaged in serious misconduct while his future wife was his student, his conduct during this time was certainly under the microscope and there was certainly some evidence of inappropriate behaviour. Further, the teacher’s relationship with the former student while she was in high school, before their relationship became intimate, was found by the Tribunal to be inappropriate even though she was no longer his student, because it remained defined by the student/teacher relationship – they were in contact because he was her former teacher and there had not been any true opportunity for the power imbalance inherent in the student/teacher relationship to dissipate. Therefore, all of the conduct that occurred during that time (such as the visits to his home, the beach and the movies) was inappropriate, because that conduct is inappropriate in a student/teacher relationship.

The Victorian Institute of Teaching (VIT) takes a different approach entirely. In its Victorian Teaching Profession’s Code of Conduct, Principle 1.5 is that teachers are always in a professional relationship with their learners, whether at the education setting where they teach or not. Under this Principle, VIT states that “a professional relationship may be compromised if a teacher…has a sexualised relationship with a former learner within two years of the learner completing their senior schooling or equivalent. In all circumstances, the former learner must be at least 18 before a relationship commences” (emphasis added).

Under these Victorian guidelines, it is not clear that the New Zealand teacher would have violated professional boundaries if the situation had instead arisen in Victoria.

What Should Schools Do?

Given that it is difficult to set a clear line on when the staff/student relationship ends and on when an intimate relationship between staff and a former student who is now an adult may or may not be inappropriate, schools should educate their staff, students and parents and carers about all of the factors set out in the various jurisdiction’s guidelines that may help to inform these discussions.

It is particularly crucial that schools include these issues when talking about maintaining professional boundaries with current students, as well as about grooming and grooming behaviour, since conduct that occurs during the staff/student relationship can impact on the appropriateness of any subsequent relationship that may form between staff and former students.