A 15-year-old Queenstown boy who created an "abusive and derogatory" online quiz about his teachers on the social networking website Facebook has been allowed to return to school, subject to several conditions.
The quiz, posted earlier this month, was littered with profanities and referred to one Wakatipu High School teacher as a drug user, while others were described as circus freaks.
A board of trustees disciplinary meeting was held this week.
Principal Lyn Cooper did not return calls, but board chairman Peter Doyle, who was not on the disciplinary committee but had followed the case, said the student had been stood down for a several days.
He had returned to school, subject to several conditions.
The conditions included counselling.
He was told that if a similar incident happened again he would face more serious action.
Mr Doyle believed he had to address the entire staff with an apology, which would have been "fairly traumatic" for a young person.
"The apology has been accepted and we can move on," he said.
Mr Doyle said a student would have to commit gross misconduct or something affecting the health and safety of staff and pupils to be expelled from the school because the nearest alternative high school was in Cromwell, 62km away.
Mr Doyle said the board was entitled to act on the pupil's behaviour because although he had compiled the quiz on his own time and off school premises, his actions had questioned a teacher's integrity.
In the quiz, the student invited friends to compare themselves to staff members at Wakatipu High School.
Users were then given the profile of the staff member they most closely matched.
Wakatipu High School deputy principal Grant Adolph earlier said he was appalled by the comments posted about the staff.
"My initial reaction is that it is abusive, derogatory and divisive."
One teacher who became aware of the quiz was upset by its contents and it made her question why she was a teacher.
The quiz has been removed from Facebook.
