‘Superhead’ faces paedophile slurs over stricter school rules

A HEADTEACHER who turned around a failing school has revealed he has been branded a paedophile in a backlash against his strict new regime.

Barry Smith, the “superhead” who last year took over previously failing high school Great Yarmouth Charter Academy, claimed he has been falsely accused both of photographing young girls and of being forcibly escorted off a junior school site for photographing children.

He even questioned whether some parents unconnected with his school wanted him to be “so filled with self-loathing” that he killed himself. In his blog this week, Mr Smith wrote: “Today someone posted an edited picture of me, depicting me as the Devil with a caption: I will make your school days hellish!

“Last week, there were lies circulated about me on Facebook saying I take photographs of Year 10 girls on my phone and that, on another occasion, I had to be forcibly escorted off a junior school site for photographing children.

“All these accusations are completely without any foundation … I’ve been accused of calling kids fat, of being racist, of bullying children, the list goes on … Do they want me to be so filled with self-loathing that I top myself?”

The Norfolk school made headlines last year after parents complained over the new “army-like” rules. Pupils were banned from using mobile phones at school and ordered to walk in single file to lessons.

The school was known for having some of the worst GCSE results in the country but the new regime, run by the Inspiration Trust, has led to the 628-pupil school being praised by Ofsted and doubling its success rate at GCSES.

Scott Lyons, the National Education Union spokesperson for Norfolk, said: “You’ve got a generation of parents who are used to social media and putting all their gripes on it, so when they have a negative experience of the school they put it online without proper regard for the impact.”