Nathan Xavier
September 05, 2021 1:10 PM
Head of House Speech by Nathan Xavier
As the feast drew to a close, Nathan Xavier stood up from the staff table and headed over to the Teppenpaw table to collect the new first years. It was a small year group in general, but they had split fairly evenly, and Teppenpaw had gained three new students, all girls. He hoped they would get along well and be glad for the companionship rather than upset that they would need to share a room."Hello, first years" he greeted them with a smile, once he had collected the small group of them. "Welcome to Teppenpaw! I am your new Head of House, Professor Xavier. I'm also the Herbology teacher here. We'll head over to our common room and your dorms now, so you can see where you will be living for the next seven years while you're here at Sonora."
He pointed out landmarks to help them find their way back to the Cascade Hall for breakfast tomorrow, and made conversation to get to know them a bit. He liked to foster a familiar family-like atmosphere in Teppenpaw and that started with getting to know each student as a person as well as sharing enough information about himself so he wouldn't feel like a strange adult who had no personal investment in them. He mentioned that he had a wife, a six-year-old, and an preschooler living with him here at the school, so they'd probably meet them over the course of the year as well, particularly since his wife was Professor Carter-Xavier, Pecari's Head of House, and the on-staff substitute teacher who covered a fair number of the DADA lessons when Tabitha was away.
"The Hospital Wing," he pointed out as they passed by its door. "With luck, you won't need it too much, but if you do, our House is located conveniently close to it. We'll just head up these stairs here, and," he stopped only partway up, "here we are." He pointed down to the step he was standing on. "Look for the diamond shaped chip," he stated, pointing at it.
"You'll need to dance a jig on the chipped stair to open the Common Room," he continued. "It goes like this." He demonstrated. He was overweight and in his mid-fifties, so it wasn't a necessarily pretty jig, but fortunately for many Teppenpaws, it did not have to be pretty. It was the steps that mattered, not their rhythm or grace, and after eighteen years of being the Teppenpaw Head - long enough ago that not even the seventh years had been born when he started - he could do those in his sleep (and was quite sure he had on a few occasions). "Repeat it two more times. Try it with me." He offered corrections when he saw mistakes, then at the end of the third repetition of step, step, step, heel-click, tap, tap, and shuffle, the wall beside him opened up, revealing the Teppenpaw Common Room, decorated in muted yellow and maroon tones.
They went in, Nathan taking the rear, and closing the wall behind him. On this side, it just looked like a door. In Nathan's opinion, the Teppenpaw Common Room was a nice relaxing space and he enjoyed spending an hour or so of each day sitting on one of the comfortable couches or chairs scattered about the room, in the hopes that familiarity bred trust and the students would voluntarily come to him if they had any issues with anything. Sometimes he would chat casually with whomever was present, and sometimes he'd invite the kids to join him in a game of exploding snap or something, and sometimes he'd just pet his old Persian cat and mind his own business unless someone sought him out.
"Your House is like your family here. As your Head of House, I'm the one responsible for your safety and well being and I take that responsibility very seriously. I just ask you all to respect one another and school property and we shouldn't have too many problems." As this was Teppenpaw, the House of diplomacy and friendship, the problems in that regard were thankfully quite few. "Also, curfew begins at ten so please be back here or in your room by that time and keep your noise level to minimum so your Housemates can sleep. Your rooms are up those stairs there, girls to the right; don't go up the left one that leads to the boys rooms or you'll just end up back down here. Your year number is on your door, and each year group gets its own room. It does mean you will all be sharing," he tried to keep a neutral tone at that, hoping not to prejudice them against the arrangement before it even properly began, either by being too enthusiastic or too sympathetic.
He pointed over to the wall beside where they had entered. "The bulletin board is posted there. That's where we display things like school and club announcements. Our prefects are Zara Jackson, Dathan Fischer, and Alexander Pierce-Beales." If any of the prefects happened to be around the Commons either by intent or chance, he pointed them out as he said their name. "Prefects are students appointed by the staff to help you find your way around or otherwise be of assistance to you. There is one from each of the upper three year groups. They can be recognized by the badges they wear. So any of those three, or myself, are good people to ask questions or bring problems to or just talk to if you need a sounding board for anything."
"Finally, unless there are any questions, I think that's about it from me. Again, welcome to Teppenpaw. Breakfast is at seven, and I have more maps and class schedules next to my office over there if you can't find yours." He gestured to a small box set next to a door labeled PROFESSOR XAVIER - OFFICE.
OOC: Welcome to Sonora and to Teppenpaw House! You may reply here with questions or just chat with your new Housemates and get to know them. You are now welcome to post your new Teppenpaw student on any board except the common rooms of other Houses or the Lounges, because first year Teppenpaw students aren't allowed in those places. You may continue your feast and orientation posts as long as you would like to, thanks to fuzzy time which basically means that while these things can be happening at the same time out of character, while in character, they are clearly happening a different times, thus allowing your character to be involved in any of them. Have fun! And we are always happy to help answer questions on the OOC board or Chatzy if you have any!
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Nathan Xavier
Head of House Speech
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