Third year students at St. Elsa’s we’re allowed to compete in competitions with other schools and districts. There were no official sports teams but a track and field club was formed and girls would be put through a rigid training exercise and compete in regional competitions come the spring. After an uneventful second half of her second year, and a dreadfully Boring summer at home Jennifer was back and practically immediately signed up for a new type of training by the school. In the third year brighter students were given access to an honours class where they learned advanced mathematics, read higher level books, and got to learn about the moons of Saturn and Jupiter. It was basically a look into what the future years would hold but condensed into one hour long block. Lisa did not make the cut which was fine to Jennifer especially considering the honours class had material in it that she didn’t know ahead of time. The second she got eighty nine on an assignment in it instead of ninety or above she was brought to the headmaster’s office and scolded about her poor grade, she was told that perfection was strives for in the acadamy and was berets until she was in tears only to be yelled at about the tears. She was then grilled until she redid the assignment in front of the headmistress and had it graded. Then she did it again and again and again until she walked out with her grade improved to a pure untainted hundred. After that her grades didn’t loiter near the nineties. They crept up to hundreds in fear of the headmistress using disappointment as a weapon again. Jennifer couldn’t believe she was weak enough to fall for verbal harassment like that but she was and it wasn’t like she could report it to her parents. When she was on the phone with them she stammered for a few seconds trying to choke out what had happened to her but ended up just telling them about her ninety seven in the honours class and listening to her parents get excited. It was a shameful defeat and afterwards the teachers suggested she try out for track and field. Jennifer wasn’t exactly tall and didn’t have a lot of stamina but Madame Criss made them run laps until they could all do one in under a minute. She made them run for the first two weeks of practice and only run until everyone finally managed to make it or simply quit the team. Girls could quit, at least all of them but Jennifer. The second she got fed up with running and quit she found herself in the headmistresses office and walked out saddled with private lessons with Madame Criss and all the running that entailed. Then they all had to jump a certain height, throw a certain distance, and leap as far as they could. Each girl was only allowed to compete in three events and younger girls were barred from Javelin and stone throw among other sports so most of the third years ended up in running, high jump, and long jump. Jennifer was signed up for the longest dash against her own wishes and had to complete the run faster than any other student or Madame Criss would make her run more laps after school let out for the day. Soon enough all that training made Jennifer so fast she could even outspeed girls a few grades above her.
In addition Jennifer’s impeccable spelling made it desirable for the school to sign her up for spelling bees. She would be told words she didn’t know and every word she failed to answer with would be met with having to spell it five times. Every day there was a sheet of a hundred words and how long she spent in that room sweaty from track practice in the gym depended solely on how good her spelling of words most adults didn’t know was.
All this training and pruning led to very little time for making friends and interacting with other girls. Instead of hanging around in a dorm room talking or playing board games she was being taught how to do her hair in the school braid and how to look like the girls in pictures from past years. Girls used to tote the perfection of the school despite the fact girls like Lisa weren’t smarter than the average public school kid.
Competitions rolled around the teacher assigned to their group told all the girls that they were expected to walk out with gold. Every girl had the same hairstyle, the same uniform, and the same worried expression on their face as if they failed they’d be put through more classes to make them more perfect.
The spelling bee was stressful as it was clear other private schools had been privately training their girls as well. All the public school kids dropped out and the judges had to resort to words from a different level. By the time Riverside Prep’s girl flunked out of the regionals Jennifer was spelling words she hadn’t practiced but she was lucky. Some of the girls had gotten into the same situation and when they lost and stood around with their silver medals the teacher just lost it and proclaimed that their loss meant people believed in their foes more than their own school.
Jennifer wasn’t done though. Soon she was spelling words for a group of judges judging every school from across Scotland. Then after that she and the grade twelve girl went all the way to nationals held in London. Jennifer’s parents were there to watch her spell and half the time she was just making educated guesses as words in French were brought out. She made it so far into the competition, she was up against a boy who had a private tutor. It was then that she was faced with the word Troubadour that she screwed up using the American spelling rather than the British spelling. Everyone clapped though and she got a silver trophy. She and the grade twelve girl had their picture taken together, her gold trophy much larger and more impressive than her own silver. Her parents were there and were so proud. Everything seemed fine until she got back to the teacher and was yelled at about her stupid mistake. Apparently nationals wasn’t good enough, first in nationals was.
A nearly identical situation hung over track and field. She ran, jumped, and leaped for hours on end and when the school team competed against other private schools her bronze in running was enough to earn a regional spot but not good enough for Madame Criss who turned her one hour practice into a three hour one. It was so intensive that she was straight gold for every level until nationals where an uncomfortably tall nine year old blew past the competition like she was an olympic runner. No excuses there. She had just failed and every success up to that point had been for naught.
When school ended Jennifer returned to the arms of her parents who were so proud of her for what she’d accomplished. But their love and admiration wasn’t good enough. She wanted the approval of the school and promised herself she wouldn’t stop trying until she got it.