The Unteachables

The Unteachables - Kasen A. from Jackson Middle School

Gordon Korman writes:

"I was born on October 23, 1963 in Montreal, Canada, and grew up mostly in the Toronto area.

My writing career began virtually by accident when I was in 7th grade. The track and field coach had to teach English. For creative writing, he gave us total freedom to work on whatever we wanted for the rest of the year. It was February. That added up to a class period per day for more than four months. The result was my first novel, THIS CAN’T BE HAPPENING AT MACDONALD HALL.

I sent my manuscript to Scholastic because I was the class monitor for Scholastic Book Orders, and figured I was practically an employee. Seriously. (Full disclosure: my mom had to type my book for me.) It was a totally flukey and random way to launch a publishing career, but here’s the thing: It worked.!THIS CAN’T BE HAPPENING AT MACDONALD HALL was published by Scholastic when I was a freshman in high school, and I was on my way.

I’ve been writing for more than three-quarters of my life. My books have been translated into 32 languages and have sold over 30 million copies worldwide. I have a BFA degree from New York University with a major in Dramatic Writing and a minor in Film and TV.

I now live on Long Island, outside New York City, with my wife and family. When I’m not writing, you can usually find me driving one of my three kids to some practice or rehearsal or game. Either that, or I’m on the road, appearing at schools, libraries, and bookstores, meeting my readers."

The Unteachables are a notorious class of misfits, delinquents, and academic train wrecks, like Aldo, with anger management issues; Parker, who can’t read; Kiana, who doesn’t even belong in this class—or any class; and Elaine (rhymes with pain). The Unteachables have been removed from the student body and isolated in room 117.

Their teacher is Mr. Zachary Kermit, the most burned-out teacher in all of Greenwich. He was once a rising star, but his career was shattered by a cheating scandal that still haunts him. After years of phoning it in, he is finally one year away from early retirement. Bu the superintendent has his own plans to torpedo that idea—and it involves assigning Mr. Kermit to the Unteachables.

The Unteachables never thought they’d find a teacher who had a worse attitude than they did. And Mr. Kermit never thought he would actually care about teaching again. Over the course of a school year, though, room 117 will experience mayhem, destruction—and maybe even a shot a redemption.

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