Ex-Caulfield Grammar headmaster Neil Lennie allegedly faked degrees during five-decade career
A former principal who taught at some of Melbourne’s most prestigious schools over five decades has been charged with fraud — accused of never holding a teaching qualification. Here’s how.
Police & Courts
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A former principal who taught at some of Melbourne’s most prestigious schools over a five-decade career has been charged with fraud, accused of never holding a teaching qualification after flunking out of university in the 1960s.
Neil Lennie, a former headmaster at Caulfield Grammar School and ex-teacher at Haileybury College and Mount Scopus, has been charged with obtaining financial advantage by deception after allegedly pocketing a handsome teaching salary to which he was never entitled.
Police allege Mr Lennie, now 72, never held a teaching registration and lied about his qualifications at least four schools, beginning in 1964.
The Herald Sun understands it will be claimed Mr Lennie adopted his father teaching registration in the late 1960s in a bid to connive his way into classrooms across the city.
Court documents reveal he is accused of falsely stating he had obtained a trained teaching certificate from the Melbourne Teaching College and claiming he had taught at various schools including Newlands, Lakeside and Norwood High Schools between 1964-1975.
Records reveal Lennie was appointed teacher at Mount Scopus in 1976 based on his allegedly fake resume, before moving to Haileybury a decade later where he allegedly added a Bachelor of Education from University of Melbourne to his qualifications.
The following year in 1988 Mr Lennie was appointed headmaster at Caulfield Grammar School before being employed at Overnewton Anglican Community College in 1997.
Mr Lennie is also charged with falsely stating he had successfully acquired a Bachelor of Applied science from the University of Melbourne and RMIT and an Associate Diploma of Business from Box Hill TAFE.
The Herald Sun understands it will be alleged Mr Lennie was in fact suspended from Melbourne university in his first year after multiple failed subjects.
Mr Lennie currently operates the Imperial College of Melbourne, a private tutoring college in Box Hill, according to the school’s website.
The Herald Sun understands “Dr” Lennie has claimed to have been the Chief Examiner in Physics, been elected a Life Member of the Australian College of Educators and to have headed the science Teachers’ Association.
Mr Lennie sat quietly in court last week during his brief filing hearing and will return to court in September.
He faces a maximum penalty of ten years for each offence.
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