To Sir, With Love

To Sir, With Love is about Mark Thackeray, an immigrant to Britain from British Guiana via California, must wait a long period to hear about an engineering job he applied for. He accepts a teaching post at North Quay Secondary School in the tough East End of London, as an interim position. Most of the school’s students have been rejected from other schools, and their antics drove the last teacher to resign. Led by Bert Denham and Pamela Dare, the students’ antics range from disruptive behavior to distasteful pranks. Thackeray retains a calm demeanor, but loses his temper upon discovering something being burned in the classroom stove (implied to be a used sanitary napkin). Thackeray orders the boys out of the classroom, then reprimands all the girls, either for being responsible or passively observing, for what he says is their slutty behavior. Thackeray is angry with himself for allowing the students to get the better of him. Changing his approach, he informs the students they will no longer study from textbooks. Until the end of term when they graduate, he will treat them as adults and expects them to behave as such; they can discuss whatever issues they wish, including relationships, marriage, sex, and applying for jobs. Thackeray gradually wins the class over except for Denham, who continually baits him.