Examiner Raul Barba
July 31, 2021 2:37 PM
CATS/RATS by Examiner Raul Barba
It was that time of year again, the time that most fifth and seventh year students dreaded-CATS and RATS. Tests that for most of them would have a major impact on their futures. For the fifth years, their CATS scores would determine which classes they would be able to continue taking, although there was no standardized score for that and it was up to the discretion of the teachers at each individual school and for each individual subject. An A might be good enough in one class but another might require an E. At a different school it might be totally different. Today's examiner, Examiner Barba, rather believed in standarizing it to be consistent across the board, but so far, nobody was listening to him.As for RATS, those could determine one's career and college prospects. Granted, some students had long ago been accepted to their schools and some people would be able to get into whatever college they wanted so long as their grades weren't awful. It generally didn't matter who your family was- if you were getting straight Ts, you probably wouldn't be going to Dofmore. One of his old friends from his own Sonora days, Cory Brockert was a good example of this . Nice guy, but an academic superstar he was not. Not that he was quite so bad as to get Ts-in fact, Raul Barba himself as well as Cory's roommate Neal Davison had seen to that, as that was how the examiner had made friends with them more or less- but nor was Cory elite college material.
Of course, the people who got Ts didn't usually have any desire to go to elite colleges so it was all good, he supposed.
Even though the reason that they'd held the exams in the Elective Hall last year, rather than in the Cascade Hall was because of a school concert, it had been decided that they would be doing them there again so students could use the empty classrooms to take their written exams. It wasn't his decision, of course, but he wholeheartedly approved of the efficiency of it all.
Once the fifth and seventh year students had all arrived in the Elective Hall, Examiner Barba took his place in front of the assembled group. While he liked to believe he had a relatively pleasant demeanor, he generally lacked the enthusiasm of his colleague, Examiner Trenton who'd been here the year before. That was okay though, since enthusiasm was not really warranted in this situation. These students were facing an exam with the power to make or break their futures for most of them, not something that was a happy fun time and Examiner Barba would treat the situation with the grave seriousness it deserved, while trying to come across as reassuring at the same time, which was the tricky part.
This was his first time doing the test introductions too. Usually he was standing in the back with everyone else. Plus, this was his alma mater too so he felt the need to do especially well. Though whatever pressure he was feeling he was sure the students were experiencing far worse.
He began to speak. "Welcome students. Today, you will begin taking your exams. Fifth years, you will be in the classroom to the right taking your CATS and seventh years, you will be in the classroom on the left, taking your RATS. You will be given anti-cheating ink, paper and quills. You may scratch out and rewrite answers if necessary as well as ask for extra paper if you run out of space. Anyone caught trying to cheat will be immediately escorted from the premises and their tests will be submitted as is, which means they will receive zeros on the tests they haven't taken" Examiner Barba felt the need to spell this out because otherwise he was sure people's imaginations would just run wild and at least one student, a blonde-haired girl, looked nauseated enough without having to imagine being hung up by her toes if she cheated on exams. Of course, he didn't think someone who was that anxious would have the nerve to try anyway but on the other hand, sometimes people like that were driven to desperation.
Examiner Barba continued on. "There will be breaks between the exams for each subject and between the written and practical exams. At those times, you may use the bathrooms and snacks and drinks will be provided." He gestured towards his fellow examiners standing behind him, who contained a full range of temperaments,some of them pleasant, some of them not. "We are here to answer any questions you have, but we cannot explain test questions to you. Those with testing accomodations, you should have a slip which explains them and will be accomodated as such."
He faced the mass of students and said. "I wish you all the best of luck today." He gave them a completely sincere smile. Examiner Barba really did want them to do well. It made him happy to see them succeed and truly never liked to hand out failures.
OOC: The blonde haired nauseous looking girl he mentions is Sapphire whom I also write
Subthreads:CATS
Ouch by Ellie Alperton
Doomed or not-doomed, that is the question... by Dathan Fischer
RATS
*gloating smugly* by Topaz Brockert
I can do this. by Katerina Vorontsov
11
Examiner Raul Barba
CATS/RATS
0
Examiner Raul Barba
1
5
System
July 31, 2021 2:37 PM
System
July 31, 2021 2:37 PM
Ellie Alperton
August 01, 2021 10:08 AM
Ouch by Ellie Alperton
Ellie took an edge of a seat, fidgeting with the unfamiliar quill. She had clocked the requirement about anti-cheating quills during one of the many class lectures about CATS, and had done her best to find out what kind of weight and thickness it would be so that she could practise with something similar. Although she had developed her quill skillz (quillz? It didn't really work as a portmnateau, the words overlapped too much already, though she nearly giggled to herself in spite of that) pretty well over the years, she had never completely broken the habit of using a ballpoint pen, given that they were just so much easier, cleaner, and available imprinted with Disney princesses. She was not looking forward to hours and hours of writing with a pointy feather.Still, if that was the least of her problems, it would probably be a good day. She had studied really hard, but it was hard not to be nervous. This felt like such a big deal, not only for her academic track record but as proof that she really belonged here, and really had adapted. She hated that the way the writing utensil felt awkward in her hand made that feel precarious from the very beginning of the test.
By the time they were given their first break, her hand was cramping horribly. She made her way to the refreshment table, flexing her fingers, massaging them with her other hand. Today would have been a great day to be ambidextrous. As it was, the best her left hand could do was handle picking up her juice whilst she continued to shake out the fingers of her right hand.
"Heyhow'sitgoing?" she asked her neighbour, in a single breath with very little spacing between the words. "I think it's going okay?" she answered her own question before they could. "What did you put for the question about usage of sparks in a non-magical area?"
13
Ellie Alperton
Ouch
1456
0
5
Topaz Brockert
August 04, 2021 4:56 PM
*gloating smugly* by Topaz Brockert
While most people were probably nervous about their exams, Topaz absolutely was not nervous at all . In fact, she was actually sort of looking forward to it. It was another chance to dominate and show her superiority over her siblings and cousins. Or at least her two older sisters who had taken their RATS already and Allegra who was taking them now. Unfortunately, Emerald had done quite well and Ruby hadn't done terribly either though certainly she wasn't a threat and would be easy to beat. Of course, Topaz was expecting to get perfect scores which neither of her older sisters had, even though Emerald had gotten Os. The seventh year sort of hated her for it but knew that she was still better and smarter than her older sister. Emerald was intelligent but Topaz was actually a genius so clearly if the Aladren alumna could get Os, the seventh year could get perfect scores.Another thing was that Topaz had taken more classes than Emerald, Ruby or Allegra. Ruby and Allegra had only taken three and Emerald had only taken four. Topaz had taken everything but Care of Magical Creatures,Divination, which was an incredibly silly class and hadn't actually had a teacher during the Aladren's intermediate years and Muggle Studies, which didn't even have a teacher now but that she wouldn't be caught dead in anyway. Of course, on the other hand, she was taking a few independent studies in Astronomy,Arithmancy, Ancient Runes and History of Magic. Which meant she would get nine RATS to Emerald's four. And Topaz was totally up for it too.
She also, of course, hoped to beat her soon to be former roommate, Snotti-Ness, but the odds were that Topaz would never know how that panned out since they would be graduating soon and she would never have to see that vile creature ever again! The seventh year could hardly wait and honestly, she could live with not knowing if she'd done better-and Topaz still didn't actually know how well that twit had done on the CATS-if it meant that she was free of dealing with that judgemental hypocrite.
Besides, nobody could beat perfect scores and even if someday, say Isla or Olaf, did that with three or four or even five RATS, it still wouldn't be as impressive as her nine. Topaz was sure she could do it, after all, she'd done it on her CATS. People could say what they wanted about her moral compass but there was no disputing that she was a genius.
The seventh year looked around the room as she waited for the examiner to begin his spiel. She noticed, with absolute glee, that Sapphire looked totally miserable. Her younger sister looked like she was going to throw up or burst into tears or pass out. Or maybe have a seizure! Maybe she'd even do all of the above. Topaz had done her very best to undermine the fifth year's confidence in her intellectual abilities for as long as she could remember and she'd been sure to do so even more over this past year. It looked like the Aladren had been incredibly successful there and she did extremely delight in her successes.
On the other hand, much to the seventh year's disappointment, Allegra only looked a normal amount of worried. Of course, this might be because the Crotalus only cared about doing her best on the RATS and not beating Topaz since doing so would not be in her best interests. On the plus side, that meant Topaz had her well trained.
The Examiner began to speak and she had to admit, she appreciated the way he treated the RATS with the seriousness and respect that they deserved. Caitlin had mentioned that the examiner who had introduced the tests last year had been way too perky and cheerful. As if taking the tests were fun for anyone besides herself and maybe the other Aladrens.
Once he'd gone through all the instructions, they received the written portions of the test, and Topaz got down to business, finding that, as she had expected, they posed no problems for her at all.
11
Topaz Brockert
*gloating smugly*
1427
0
5
Dathan Fischer
August 18, 2021 4:17 PM
Doomed or not-doomed, that is the question... by Dathan Fischer
So-doomed. So-doomed. So-doomed.Had the combination of his robes making slightly noises when he moved always combined with his footfalls to sound so much like that? Or had someone put a curse on - like - his clothes, the floor, his ears, or any combination of those up to and including all of them?
The written exam had been...fine. Dathan guessed, anyway, or at least hoped. He had felt like some of his answers on the less straightforward, less tell-me-what-you-memorized-and-that's-all, questions might have been absurdly childish, and he wouldn't be surprised if he had nightmares for a while about failing all the exams because of trouble remembering how to spell weird wizard words, but it hadn't been the complete and utter series of disasters he had feared it would be. Remembering that gave him a little confidence going into the practical exams, but only so much. Not, for instance, apparently enough to make his feet stop portending doom over and over again.
So-doomed, so-doomed, so-doomed.
His classmates, even his own cousin, felt a little like a different species now. They all seemed so smart, so talented, so put together, and...stuff. Was he really the only one here who felt like everything was about to go horribly wrong and irrevocably ruin their lives for the rest of their lives?!
At least, he thought, was kind of better off, in one way at least, than Jezebel? Fischer was reasonably close to the front of the alphabet, at least compared to Reed-Fischer. At least, one way or the other, it would be over sooner for him.
So-doomed, so-doomed, so-doomed.
"Good afternoon," his examiner said, seeming entirely neutral toward whether it really was or not. "Please cast a charm to make this balloon flash between three colors."
Dathan knew he almost certainly had a really, really stupid look on his face as he said, "Huh? I know how to do that!" He closed his mouth and cleared his throat, trying to pretend he didn't know exactly the unflattering shade of red he'd just turned. "Uh, what I meant to say was - does it matter which colors?"
"Any three of your choice," said the examiner. Then, a bit more kindly, "Take your time, and try not to be nervous."
"Not nervous. Right. Definitely trying that," he said, thinking as hurriedly as he could to figure out what might go okay - well, to the extent that anything did - with purple and lime green. He settled on orange simply because it was the first thing after white, which his vague memories of grade school art class made him think might not be a color, that his brain threw up at him, and began really, really hoping that the examiners weren't going to secretly use stuff like their color choices as any kind of inkblot personality test or anything like that.
16
Dathan Fischer
Doomed or not-doomed, that is the question...
1457
0
5
Katerina Vorontsov
August 19, 2021 8:55 PM
I can do this. by Katerina Vorontsov
The exam leader stopped talking, and for one moment, Katya felt herself slipping down toward total, blind, unthinking panic.This had been a terrible idea. There was no way she could do this. What had she been thinking, imagining for one second that she could do this? She should have exploited the idea of her foreignness for once, should have either refused outright to sit the exams because of entirely fictional cultural reasons or else asked for special treatment, a translator, maybe -
Around her, she could hear quills starting to scratch and somehow that brought her back to herself. She took a shaky breath, opened her inkwell, and got to work.
Explain why objects charmed to have wings are not considered alive in the same way independently moving Transfiguration items are.
She read it once, and then read it again, but after the second reading, she was still confident that she understood the question the test was asking. She was also reasonably sure she could form an answer to it. She knew this. She could do this.
She started writing.
That self-assurance took her through the written portion of the exam and the midday break, but she still felt a flutter of nerves as - at long last; curse her surname and its position in the English alphabet. In her own language, the letter they rendered 'V' looked like the letter they rendered as 'B,' which was right up front, which made the whole thing seem distinctly unfair - she went into her practical exam. She kept her face frozen into a serene, American-smiling mask, but her knuckles were white on the handle of her wand she approached her examiner.
"Hello," she said pleasantly, bowing slightly. "I am Katerina Vorontsov. Please, direct me."
She thought she saw a flicker of uncertainty in the examiner's eyes, which sent another flicker of discomfort up her spine. As she began casting spells, her shoulders grew tighter and tighter - she was taking her time so she could get her pronunciations exactly right when she needed to cast a verbal spell, but what if it sounded as though she was thinking slowly, or simply didn't know what she was doing? What if speed was part of the score? What was she going to do in the DADA exam...?
She tried to push it all out of the way, to envision her mind as a still, frozen pond smooth enough to skate on. She could not worry about all that right now. It would work out or it would not. There was only now.
Finally, she was dismissed, and made it to a corner where she was confident no-one could see her before she sagged a little as the tension began trying to drain away. She had made it through the first round. One down, too many more to go.
16
Katerina Vorontsov
I can do this.
1418
0
5