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Stephanie "Steph" Haydock was a French teacher at Waterloo Road. She had little control over her classes, limited respect from the pupils and was a pretty hopeless teacher. Everyone was fond of her and they turned a blind eye to the brutal fact that she was a rubbish French teacher, but Steph harbours a maternal nature which is displayed a lot over her time at Waterloo Road. Even though she left the school, she proved a loyal friend to members of staff by returning several times when they needed her.

She returns for a short stint in Series 6 Episode 9 and Episode 10 after being contacted by Ruby Fry to help Grantly place his wife in a care home. Steph was the longest serving female teacher, appearing in 79 episodes.

She was portrayed by Denise Welch.

Personality

Steph is portrayed as a pretty hopeless teacher with a taste for bending the rules. Whilst her inability to keep control over her class and help them learn properly does bother her deep down, she manages to remain in denial for most of her time at Waterloo Road.

Despite this, she has a maternal nature that most of the pupils and staff are fond of. This is displayed when she ends up taking in troubled student Maxine Barlow and eventually fostering her up until Maxine is killed, leaving Steph devastated.

She is a great friend and a shoulder to cry on for most of the staff at Waterloo Road, but sometimes has a bit of a reputation for 'sticking her nose in' and becoming too involved. Steph conceals and tries to help out her pupils as much as possible, sometimes leading to even more trouble, but she does it out of the goodness of her heart.

Series 1 & 2

Steph Haydock Series 1

Steph Haydock is the head of French at Waterloo Road. She is a lenient teacher, knowing she can't control her classes often, despite this the pupils seem to like her. Due to this, her classes are usually 'running wild'. Nobody at the school has respect for her, not even her colleagues. Haydock's rivalry with Davina Shackleton has driven her to report her one-night stand with sixth-former Brett Aspinall to headteacher Jack Rimmer, who initially dismissed it as "mailicious gossip" as he believed she was manipulating his relationship with Davina as she was jealous and had chosen Brett as the pupil to implicate as she knew he hated Brett. However, Davina soon confessed that she had once dated Brett, and Jack only got over this when he was sure that it happened before either of them came to Waterloo Road. Before Jack realised that Steph's story was true, he was ready to have her dismissed from the school as it wasn't the first time she'd caused problems for him and other teachers.

Haydock then went on to tell Jerry Preston (the highly religious American sponsor) about Shackleton's encounter with Brett. Jerry demanded that she be sacked for he didn't like Davina that much, as did Roger Aspinall. Rimmer agreed only for a short while until he reinstated Davina and told Jerry and Roger where to go with their money. This has not made Haydock give up on getting rid of her love rival.

She began housing former pupil and homeless drug addict Maxine Barlow.

Series 3

Steph Haydock Series 3

She is now the head of Pastoral Care, after former head of Pastoral Care Kim Campbell went to work in Rwanda with Andrew Treneman. However, at the beginning of the second half of the series, she was in France with Tom Clarkson filling in for her. Upon her return, the pair briefly shared an office, before headteacher Rachel Mason informed Steph that Tom would be taking over the job permanently. However, she was later made Financial Director. In Episode 19, she was removed from the role of Finance Director after using sexual harassment as a means of getting money for the school.

Series 4

Steph Haydock Series 4

In Series 4 Episode 1, Steph interviewed for the role of Head of Extended Services but didn't get the job, with it going to Melissa Ryan.

Steph had to contend with the advances of Security Dave (played by Denise Welch's real-life then-husband Tim Healy) and was forced to fob him off with the excuse that she and Grantley were having an affair. However, she didn't expect Dave to tell Grantly's wife, Fleur, of the "affair" when she visited the school, as she and Steph were trying to organise a surprise birthday party for Grantly. But despite telling Fleur that there was a misunderstanding between her and Grantley's relationship, Fleur kicked Grantley out of their home for good and he had no choice but to stay at Steph's house. Grantly and Fleur later reconciled and he was allowed to move back in.

In Episode 8 of the series, Steph drove home to find her ward Maxine dying after she had been tragically and fatally shot by Earl Kelly. Maxine died in the arms of Steph and pupil Janeece Bryant. Steph was distraught after Maxine's body was carried away in a body bag. Rachel Mason arrived at the house as Maxine's corpse was taken away, and Steph spoke of her belief that Maxine would still be alive if the school hadn't used Earl as a "pet project" for how progressive they were with regards to inclusion in mainstream schools. Her hate of Rachel Mason shows through this episode.

In Episode 11, Peter Sutherland, police officer and former pupil of Waterloo Road, returns to the school for careers day. Steph and Pete find themselves alone in the classroom as nobody turns up to his presentation, due to him being overlooked by model Sarah-Leanne. The two have a steamy make out session in the book cupboard. When Pete admits he still lives with his parents, Steph tells him that she doesn't want to be a part of his school boy fantasy.

In Episode 15, Steph went into hiding with Grace, the adoptive daughter of Kim Campbell, after a member of the Home Office visited Kim's house in search of Grace.

After returning with Grace, Steph returned to work, telling Rachel she had had the mumps, and would come under fire by both students and teachers over her treatment of a student, Tasha Lefton, who Steph suspected of hiding something. This was later proven correct as Tasha had not been taking the right amounts of insulin so that she would lose weight. A few weeks later, Steph would once again help Kim avoid the immigration when she lied to the police about where Kim had run to.

Series 5

Steph seems to take a particular dislike to Ruby Fry, the new food tech teacher, calling her a "frigid cow". However, when Ruby has a particularly bad day involving her losing her house, her car, and pretty much all of her prized and expensive possessions due to major debt, the two resolve their differences.

Steph's lack of organisation and lesson plans comes into light when coming into contact with new Executive Head, Max Tyler, and Head of Modern Languages, Jo Lipsett. Jo also tries to trick Steph into kissing her by way of a warning that if she doesn't pull her socks up she'll be fired from the job. After a rough day at work, Jo takes Steph to a gay club and at the end of the episode we see Steph and Jo in bed together. However, in the next episode, we find out that Jo merely put Steph to bed - drunk - and slept on the other side. However, this was the start of a really good friendship with Jo and Jo realized that Steph's expertise was pastoral care because of her rapport with the children.

Steph continued her friendship with Kim Campbell and gave her advice on Max. Max was aware of this and decided to sack Steph by using Jo Lipsett and manipulating both of them so both friends fall out. Jo hates Max for this and leaves Waterloo Road. However, Rachel Mason stamped out Max's bullying towards the MFL Department and decided to reinstate Jo and Steph leading to the climax of Max's departure in the next episode.

In Episode 14, Steph met Oliver Mead, father of science teacher Chris Mead. He accidentally started a romance with Steph after almost crashing his car into hers when didn't she put her indicators on. In Episode 20, the two were seen together at the school ball.

Series 6

She is called by Ruby in Episode 9 to come and help Grantly about Fleur's alzheimers. Steph is the one that reveals the truth about Fleur's illness to Karen Fisher and it is also revealed that Steph herself was the one who decided to leave the teaching profession. She was, however, not very happy about her replacement in the Foreign Language department, Francesca Montoya.

Trivia

  • Steph was the longest serving female teacher appearing from Series 1 to Series 5 and making a guest appearance in Series 6. The only characters who served longer were Grantly Budgen, Tom Clarkson and Janeece Bryant (although she was absent in Series 5).
  • Steph had brown hair in the first episode of the show but from Series 1 Episode 2 onwards she had blonde hair.
  • In Series 3 Episode 19, Steph says that she's been teaching at Waterloo Road for nearly 20 years.
  • In Series 5, when questioned by Jo Lipsett, she says her degree is "an old-fashioned third". Though it's likely she matriculated in an era where just getting a degree was impressive, it is very difficult to find graduate employment with less than a second-class degree, suggesting Waterloo Road may have been extremely desperate for an MFL teacher.

Quotes



  • Steph: "If I had a black coffee, and I added milk, then what would happen?"
  • Tom: "I'd have to make myself another coffee, I like mine black."

  • "Love you, Max."

  • "I'm blackmailing you, Bolton, keep up."

  • "Matt, the doorbell mooed."

  • "You know, me and my Maxine, whenever one of us was down, we'd curl up on the sofa with a bar of chocolate and have a good old moan."

  • Security Dave: "Nasty things guns, Miss Haydock. I'm just trying to keep everybody safe."
  • Steph: "Yes well I'm hardly likely to have an Uzo machine gun in there am I?"

  • Helen: [About Max] "I know he can be a bit severe, but, he is a pretty inspirational leader."
  • Steph: "Really? So was Mussolini."

  • "Listen, matey, you can sleep in your own time. Get your pen out and get some work done."

  • "More of you. The full package. So you're either in or you're out. A simple 'no' and I'll-" (final line of her regular stint)

  • "It's Grantly, Fleur." (first line upon her guest return in Series 6)

  • "Oh well. What do footballers know about real women anyway? I would much rather spend the night with a bunch of teachers down the pub." (final line)
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