A BC teacher who showed Grade 6 and 7 pupils sexually suggestive content from his own social media sites has been suspended for one month.

According to a Feb. 4 BC Commissioner for Teacher Regulation decision, elementary school teacher Tariq Mahmood Malik encouraged students to view his numerous social media sites which contained unsuitable content.

"He used his students for his advantage in building and promoting his social media accounts...(and) failed to maintain appropriate professional boundaries, by interacting with students as if he was a peer, rather than an adult and a professional," the BC Commissioner for Teacher Regulation said in the decision.

Malik became a registered teacher in 2020 and taught in an unnamed elementary school in North Vancouver.

The decision says while working as a teacher librarian he had several social media accounts under the name "Viet Paki" one which identified himself as a teacher.

"The social media accounts had no privacy setting and were fully accessible. They included video content created by Malik, which was not appropriate for elementary-aged students," the decision reads.

The content included sexually suggestive and explicit content, images of scantily clad women, and "derogatory and stereotypical presentations of women in videos about the 'types' of women to date in Vancouver and Vietnam."

The teacher told his students about the videos and many of them watched them.

The decision says he also exchanged messages with at least four students and followed one student on social media.

In June 2024, when on the library computer, he showed students a video from one of his social media accounts.

The videos included "My Sister is a Demon" a dating show parody called "Love Awaits" and a 1980s kids versus millennials video.

"These videos were not appropriate for elementary-aged students because they included sexually suggestive content and inappropriate language. One of the videos was rated 18+," the decision reads.

The teaching regulator also says that in addition to this Malik touched female students on their shoulders and the back of their neck.

"He hugged at least three female students. He sometimes poked their stomachs, including when the student was wearing a crop top," the decision says.

He also stood "very close" to female students when they were reading school announcements and said he had to so he could see the script.

"Some of the students felt uncomfortable because of how close Malik stood to them," the decision says.

The decision says Malik rode a Kawasaki motorbike and had a key chain in the word "Kawasexy" which he showed to students and asked them if they thought it was cool.

On a separate occasion, when a student was singing a Sabrina Carpenter song he pulled up a picture of her wearing a bikini and said she was "cute."

In June 2024, he asked female Grade 6 and 7 students if they would be filmed for his YouTube account and to get their parents' permission before he posted it online.

He then posted a video from a student whose parents hadn't consented.

"One parent who consented to their child being recorded thought that Malik intended to use the video recordings in a school-related way," the decision reads.

Once he was told he was under investigation he deleted some of the content from his social media accounts, but some of it, which was inappropriate, remained available.

In November 2024, he was suspended for 30 days without pay and ordered to complete a course on respectful boundaries and have two sessions with an occupational psychologist to address "appropriate interactions with children."

The regulator says that Malik did not act in the best interest of children and that his social media accounts "undermined the integrity and reputation of the teaching profession."

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