The Blackboard Jungle: Evan Hunter

Richard Dadier, a World War Two Veteran who has recently qualified as a secondary school teacher, now must spend a year teaching at a vocational school in New York. The boys at the school are rough, tough and basically illiterate and most of the teachers are just trying to survive their day job, referring to the school as the garbage can that keeps filth off the streets. Dadier can't accept his and initially wins the respect of his students, but loses it when he steps in to prevent the rape of a female teacher by a student. From that moment on...war is declared between Dadier and his students and it can only end with a showdown of the most brutal sort. This is not Goodbye Mr Chips or To Sir, With Love: this controversial story cracked down on the public school system and student violence. Dadier knows the students here will be tough, but nothing has prepared him for the savagery of the world he enters.