[1] Waterloo Road's third series aired in the United Kingdom on Thursdays at 8:00 pm GMT on BBC One, a terrestrial television network, where it received an average of five million viewers per episode.

This series opened with headteacher Jack Rimmer (Jason Merrells) recording an emotional message for the entire school to hear, following the death of his colleague Izzie Redpath (Jill Halfpenny).

Jack's second-in-command Andrew Treneman (Jamie Glover) was replaced by Eddie Lawson (Neil Morrissey), having accepted a teaching post in Rwanda alongside Kim Campbell (Angela Griffin) at the end of Series 2.

One of the major plots this series is the marriage between two pupils, Chlo Grainger (Katie Griffiths) and Donte Charles (Adam Thomas).

These doubts are confirmed when Donte finds Chlo sleeping with her sister Mika's (Lauren Drummond) boyfriend, Brett Aspinall (Tom Payne).

Another central character this series is Davina Shackleton (Christine Tremarco), who is accused of having a sexual relationship with pupil, Brett, and who was then forced to date his father.

Andrew Treneman, having played Deputy Head in the first two series, was replaced by Neil Morrissey who was cast in the role of Eddie Lawson.

Other new members of staff this series included NQT teacher Jasmine Koreshi (Shabana Bakhsk) and the newly appointed openly gay Head of Music and Drama Matt Wilding (Chris Geere).

As the gates open for a new term at Waterloo Road, the school is firmly in the spotlight following the murder of drama teacher, Izzie Redpath.

Meanwhile, Steph is relishing her new position as head of pastoral care, but disaster looms as a new pupil, Karla Bentham, who has Asperger syndrome, is placed in her less-than-capable hands.

Utter chaos ensues when Grantly is on the receiving end of one of Karla's violent outbursts, leaving new Deputy Eddie Lawson to pick up the pieces.

In a client's house, Chlo manages to call Tom, who with the police in tow, makes a mad dash over to save her, whilst back at school, Mika hits the bottle.

Rachel is bemused when developer Stuart Hordley shows up and makes a plea to reinstate his bid to build Waterloo Road's training centre.

A member of the Waterloo Road exam board visits the school, as the plagiarism scandal instigated by Maxine Barlow comes to their attention.

As he was the only member of staff who knew of the cheating, Grantly Budgen decides to meet the exam board head on, determined not to let anyone else find out about his actions.

As they burst into flames it ignites a leaky gas canister, leading to a massive explosion and sending a fireball ripping through the school's canteen.

All box sets for the third series were released with a "12" British Board of Film Classification (BBFC) certificate (meaning it is unsuitable for viewing by those under the age of 12 years).