A teacher at a Fulham school for pupils with special educational needs has been allowed to keep teaching after a professional conduct panel found she gave a vulnerable pupil books containing sexually explicit images.
Fiona Simpson taught A-level photography at Burlington House School, a £51,552-a-year independent school in Fulham. She was dismissed during her probationary period in March 2023 and referred to the Teaching Regulation Agency that June. Following a hearing in October 2026, a panel found her guilty of unacceptable professional conduct — but decided against banning her from the classroom.
The case moved slowly through the system. Ms Simpson joined the school in November 2022. She was dismissed during her probationary period in March 2023, and the school referred her to the Teaching Regulation Agency three months later. The panel hearing did not take place until October 2026 — more than three years after she left the school.
The books at the centre of the case included Diary by Corinne Day and Emotions & Relations. Ms Simpson told the panel she did not believe in censoring the arts, describing the pupils as “young adults” who “should definitely know about the history of photography and the key figures within it”.
The panel said the use of the artists’ work was not inherently inappropriate. Its concern, it said, was “about the apparent disregard for the needs of a vulnerable pupil”. There was, the panel found, no evidence that the material had been given with any supervision, support or context. “It ought to have been readily apparent to Ms Simpson that providing this material in such an unstructured fashion to a vulnerable pupil came with significant risk to their wellbeing,” the panel said, adding that there was no suggestion she had considered that risk or discussed how to approach such sensitive imagery with colleagues.
The panel also considered two further incidents. Ms Simpson was found to have tapped the pupil on the bottom with a book or magazine — CCTV footage showed her swinging the item towards the pupil as they walked ahead of her. She maintained the contact was unintentional and said the gesture was meant to encourage the pupil to return to class, but the panel concluded it was “inappropriate” and “entirely unwarranted”. In a separate incident, she took an unwell pupil to a café during school hours.
Despite finding her guilty of unacceptable professional conduct, the panel recommended that no prohibition order should be imposed, describing her misconduct as being at the “lower possible end of the spectrum”. It said there was no evidence Ms Simpson had developed insight into her behaviour and warned there was a risk it could be repeated. However, the panel concluded that publication of its findings would alert prospective employers to the risks and allow schools to put appropriate supervision in place.
The Teaching Regulation Agency is the body that investigates allegations of serious misconduct by teachers in England. Where a panel finds unacceptable professional conduct, it can recommend a prohibition order, which would bar the teacher from teaching in schools — or it can decide, as here, that publishing its findings is enough. A teacher who is not prohibited can continue to teach, but the published findings remain available to any school considering employing them.
In a separate case, a Croydon teacher was jailed for seven and a half years after admitting child sexual offences.
