A teenager went to college to take an exam after being stabbed four times in a vicious and unprovoked attack.

Bradley Halton, 18, was dubbed Britain’s most dedicated student, after used tissue paper to plug the screwdriver wounds to his leg while he completed the test.

The trainee decorator was walking to Barking and Dagenham College when he was ambushed by a gang of four or five men.

They racially abused him before repeatedly plunging the screwdriver into the back of his right thigh.

One of the men grabbed his throat, while another held him around the waist as he was bundled to the ground.

The gang fled leaving a shaking Bradley to tend his own wounds. He then walked on to college where he took the exam, part of his second-year vocational course.

His girlfriend called paramedics when the pain became unbearable, who rushed him to Royal London Hospital in Whitechapel before calling his mother to tell her of the attack.

His fellow students described him as the most dedicated in Britain.

The teenager’s mother Donna, 41, said: “Getting a call like that is every mother’s worst nightmare. My whole world felt like it was crashing down in that moment.

“I didn’t know what had happened. When she said he’d been stabbed I was thinking he was lying in a gutter somewhere.

“But he just carried on and went to college to sit the exam after getting some tissues to put in the holes in his leg. He loves college and has just gone into his second year.”

Bradley was given an x-ray and his wounds were stitched up before he was discharged. He returned to college for the first time yesterday.

A Met Police spokesman said: “At 2.45pm on September 16, police were called by the ambulance to the home of an 18-year-old man from Dagenham who had suffered a stab wound to his leg.

“The victim alleged that he was attacked from behind by a group of Asian males at 9am that morning. He was punched and kicked to the ground and stabbed in the thigh.

“This appears to have been a motiveless attack. No property was stolen.”

Anyone with information should contact Barking and Dagenham CID by dialling 101 or call Crimestoppers anonymously on 0800 555 111 quoting reference 5115029/14.