B.C. teacher suspended for leaving out a box of 20 carving knives in class

A Peace River South district teacher has been disciplined by the B.C. Teacher Regulation Branch for leaving out a box of knives in his classroom.

It's one action in a long disciplinary list against high school teacher Richard Payne, who was suspended without pay for two days after he left out the "unsecured box of 20 carving knives" on May 3, 2017. 

"Students had unlimited access to the knives for approximately two hours, until another teacher and the school principal found and removed them from the room," reads a consent resolution agreement dated April 1. 

When Payne couldn't find the knives, he didn't report it to the school, the agreement says. He was suspended without pay for two days.

Previous offences

The agreement outlines several other disciplinary actions against Payne. In October 2011, he was sent a letter of reprimand following allegations that he had broken a meter stick over a student's back.

In March of that year, he pulled a student from his chair and hit the student on the arm.

He was suspended without pay after grabbing a Grade 8 girl's face and blowing on her nose in January 2014. 

A few days after the knife incident, Payne was suspended another two days without pay for letting his P.E. class go on a run — which had been known to last up to an hour — in a public park without any supervision.

"Instead of accompanying his students on the run, or arranging for them to join two other P.E. classes which went on the same run but with supervision, Payne sat on a bench at the school waiting for his students to return," the agreement says. 

Payne told the district investigators that he hadn't joined students on their runs for years. 

He has been ordered to take a course on creating a positive learning environment or risk losing his teaching qualification.