A week later, on Monday morning, in the weight room, Pablo meets with his football teammates. They start discussing ACT scores since they were released early in the morning.

“Woohoo! A twenty-one!” Finn exclaims when his teammates start arriving.

“If I may, I say this is the time to get an appointment with counseling!” Virginie tells Finn, knowing other juniors in the weight room would overhear her. Including Valter, and a few juniors on other sports teams.

“I wonder how long we will need to wait…” Valter sighs, while doing squats.

“That I have no idea, but it will depend on how many people will book appointments” Virginie tells her boyfriend.

I guess it’s first come, first serve, Pablo seems to realize that some of his teammates have their work cut out for them, and some of them struggle to see a future after graduation. That, even though they scrambled left and right to get help to study for the ACT. Sometimes you just can’t have it all… I wonder if my teammates’ assistance has benefited Heath, Richard or Orson. I’m curious to see what Ethan, Dayton scored, with Natalie helping them out.

The opportunity will come in the locker room, shortly before the bell rings. On his girlfriend’s advice, Valter sends an email requesting an appointment with counseling. They never seem to discuss subscores.

“What did you guys get on the ACT?” Valter asks his footballer friends. “Twenty-seven for me”

“Twenty-nine” Ethan answers.

“Yeah, right, when you date a... HSNCT qualifier, you can study however you want!” Finn points out sarcastically.

“And I had help from those you call HSNCT qualifiers!” Orson adds to this cacophony. “Even after learning, as they asked me, some pre-calculus, I still got a twenty-five!”

“Same here: I, too, studied with the same HSNCT qualifiers as Orson, I got a twenty-four” Heath adds his score.

“Although the coach made me get help that I wouldn’t have asked for otherwise, and Carrie, too, I got a twenty-one” Finn breaks the news to his teammates, before texting Carrie about it.

“I guess, I am happy for you...” Pablo sighs while he hears about Richard and Dayton. He then turns to Heath and Orson. “How does it feel to ask for help from underclassmen on the quiz bowl team?”

“Asking for help from the quiz bowl team is just like asking help from any other tutor. I didn’t feel much of a difference between having Natalie or Audrey tutor us” Orson answers.

“Yeah, there are times where I had Natalie as a semi-private tutor with Finn, Orson and Heath!” Dayton adds.

“Both pushed us to learn new material!” Heath laments.

“I would love to see the face of the career development teacher...” Richard comments on his own ACT score. “If you thought Audrey and Natalie were mostly the same as ACT tutors, you must have realized just how academically top-heavy the quiz bowl team really is! I even let Nadine tutor me!”

It appears that, everywhere juniors are, they talked only about their ACT scores. And certainly during the career development course. The athletes in Heather’s section are seated in the back.

“Although, at the beginning of the year, you were taught about TOPS, today, we will go into greater detail about college applications, community or four-year. About how to choose an institution to apply to. Now that you have your ACT scores on hand, please check your current GPA, and pay attention to both unweighted and weighted!” Steven, the career development teacher, harangues the students.

I guess, I can be thankful for Audrey and her quiz bowl teammates: I somehow scored a 35 in both math and science on the ACT, Heather ruminates as she listens to the teacher talking about how the starting point of post-graduation life begins with these two numbers. About how scoring a 33 on the ACT is putting her in an uncomfortable position. That, up to this point, she made no real academic splash. Sometimes I wonder if I was too harsh on Audrey after this heart-breaking loss at Wossman; she’s clearly the brainiac of both the boys’ and girls’ basketball teams. However, with this 33 on the ACT, I wonder how the dynamic will change for me at school, now that people catch wind of these stats. For better or for worse.

And she is reminded of the harsh reality of the majority of the student body, as well as how her own reality is equally harsh, but in different ways. About how the options of so many are restricted to regional institutions, and hence a lot of what the teacher is talking about is tailored towards the local offerings.

The teacher lists a few names, clearly the strongest students in the section on both measures, whom the teacher wishes to meet with after class.

“The reason why I asked you all to stay after class is that I believe there is one thing I should tell you now. It’s okay not to attend an elite college, and a rejection from an elite college is in no way an indictment of any lack of skill on your part” Steven tells the top students in the section, before turning to Heather. “While I saw you play, and you played well during the state tournament, I’m afraid you must approach college as if you were an ordinary student!”

This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

“Does this mean that I can’t rely on basketball to go to college?” Heather asks, dreading the teacher’s answer.

“Unfortunately, yes” the teacher realizes that he made Heather start crying.

Even at 3.80/33, I’m still not Ivy League material from an academic standpoint. However, the coach makes me feel it’s not realistic for me to aim for the all-state team for next season, Heather ruminates, causing the clock to tick on her basketball life. I guess, I can always ED at Tulane if push comes to shove so long as I can maintain that 3.80… or just try to look at colleges with an eye on merit aid, and not just need-based aid! Just without hoops.

At lunch, Audrey sits next to Carrie, who, in turn, tries to comfort Heather, who’s crying after asking clarification from Kent about her college hoops prospects. Unfortunately, Kent bears the same news as Steven.

“Why are you crying, Heather?” Carrie asks her basketball teammate.

“Because the coach told me I have no real chance at college hoops!” Heather told her basketball teammates.

“I guess, if you can’t count on basketball to go to college, I can’t either! It’s not the end of the world! You still have relatively good grades, I basically have a choice between McNeese and UL-Lafayette only, if I wanted to go to a four-year!” Carrie retorts.

“The cold, hard truth is that we made it as far as we did in the state tournament with strong teamwork. However, Carrie is right, in that she is more or less on your level as a basketball player, at least if the Wossman game is anything to go by” Audrey points out, before turning to Carrie. “However, I have a question, Carrie: how much did you get on the ACT?”

“Twenty-three. But I had to use the tutor(s) of the boys’ basketball players, as well as my boyfriend’s, to get there…”

“Carrie, who, other than me, did the boys’ basketball players have for tutors? And Finn, then?” Audrey asks.

“Natalie is the only one I really worked with, other than you, because she’s a semi-private tutor. Sometimes Natalie worked with the boys’ basketball players, sometimes with Finn and his teammates…”

“There’s nothing wrong with attending UL-Lafayette or McNeese. However, don’t feel obligated to go to college if you’re not ready” Virginie tells Carrie about her predicament.

Why? Why, of all people, the person who signaled the beginning and end of quarters at home basketball games would even tell me that? Carrie shakes her head at the implications of whether she might actually be ready to attend college by graduation time. However, from the looks of it, Carrie seems to be affected the most by this talk of college readiness.

“Wait, Virginie! What does college readiness mean to you?” Carrie asks Virginie, as Pablo also arrives at the lunch table.

“There’s more to being ready for college than just being good at school” Virginie answers the basketball players, both boys and girls since they sit on opposite sides of the same table. “There’s autonomy, emotional maturity as well as one’s sense of direction in life”

Say what you will about autonomy, but from what I heard around the quiz bowl circuit, there are those parents who would do everything for their child even if it hurts them in the long run. Also, I believe that Charlotte and Taylor still haven’t gotten over the playoff loss, Audrey reflects on what could make someone not ready for college even though they are academically prepared. However, it makes me question how good is the “quarter-buzzer trumpeter” in class.

I have, like, a 2.8. It’s not like I can even sniff LSU, let alone aim for the Ivy League, and possibly play in it, like Audrey, Carrie sighs, hurrying to finish her lunch.

During quiz bowl practice, both people still hear about juniors discussing ACT scores, but there are only two juniors on the team, both of whom play on the A-team. Myriam and Scott.

“So I got a thirty-six, what I need most is performing well at the HSNCT now” Myriam mentions what she feels is needed most going forward.

“I feel you on the HSNCT. I got a thirty-four, I feel like anything is possible so long as we do well at the HSNCT!” Scott adds, while he books his appointment with Steven.

Hopefully this will end soon. I couldn’t spend even five seconds with juniors without hearing about the ACT, and whether they plan on retaking it! Pablo ruminates.

However, all 3 teams, even the middle school one, start practicing using past collegiate sets. Such as the latest ICT Division II packets publicly available, or other sets deemed of equivalent difficulty. Such as the latest ACF Regionals, in which several past VA quiz bowlers played.

By the end of the drill, in which so many questions seemed to require more time before people could buzz in, and, for the middle school team, waiting on the For ten points cue fairly often, Josiane voices a complaint to the coach.

“Why is it that we must drill on these sets? These sets feel far too hard for middle school!” Josiane questions the rationale behind using an ICT D2 packet for the drill.

“Sometimes, there is no substitute for learning from hard sets. Remember what Marcia told us at this rivalry fundraiser against DCC: actual high school quiz bowl isn’t that hard!” Warren tells her. “What sets do you think your opponents at the MSNCT use to train?”

“I don’t know, maybe stuff such as the sets used at high school quiz bowl-State?” Josiane hesitates a little bit.

“It seems like the ACT and tutoring for it has taken their toll on us playing on the A-Team. I understand that, for juniors, the ACT means a lot to you, but the B-team beating us on this drill shows the accumulation of ACT fatigue, as well as State” Leonard, the A-team history player, a senior, points out, while he and Audrey were the best A-team players on this drill.

“For this reason, I urge you to limit your tutoring activities until the finals season!” Myriam calls on the team to recenter their priorities, while placing bets on horse races in her mother’s name on mobile.

“It’s a bit unfair to blame it on ACT fatigue; Nadine and I have both been tutoring folk on it!” Pablo retorts, causing the upperclassmen to gasp upon hearing that lowerclassmen quiz bowlers were somehow involved in ACT tutoring, despite the test being a year away.

At the end of the practice, Pablo feels like the day has been a little rough. He feels a little tired of the stresses of the past few weeks, so he hugs Audrey once again…

“Do you want to go to my home, and we will then watch a movie tonight?” Pablo asks her.

“And, of course, finish our homework beforehand…” Audrey answers him, too.