On the morning of July 4, Faith and Valerie are brought to the parochial radio station for what has become a parish tradition whenever some student from the parish makes it to MOP, whereby any MOPper announces their TSTST results on air, and the parochial newspaper starts tracking the race to the IMO. Valerie goes live first:
"Dear Jefferson Davis parishioners, I am Valerie Watkins, a rising senior at Venomous Agendas High. On the Fourth of July, I have bad news for you. I didn't make it to the top-thirty at the TSTST this year. It was fun while it lasted" Valerie then hands off the mic to Faith.
"I am Faith Kingsford, a rising junior at Venomous Agendas High. Because I finished twentieth at the TSTST, and fourth among girls, for the third season in a row, we have a Venomous Agenda girl in the race to the IMO!"
Yet Glen has yet to receive the answer from the legislature regarding the budget requests under the EEF and the MSPGO.
It's too late for this year, but VA getting girls in the race to the IMO 3 years in a row must not be done at the expense of the other schools in the parish! At the same time, I'm afraid that the parish won't even see one school consistently getting girls to compete in the race to the IMO as a sign of intra-parish instructional inequality for MSPGO purposes, but a sign that the whole parish doesn't need state money beyond EEF and MFP. Or really, they might not even know what the IMO is; however, the legislators in Bâton-Rouge know about the EGMO because my predecessor made requests under MSPGO by using the EGMO as a sign of math disparity. That netted us a grand total of $100k. This year, there's a grand total of $25 million each up for grabs under MSPGO and EEF, Glen reflects on the actual dollar amounts he expects to obtain from these 2 grant programs. In a region as impoverished as southwest Louisiana, every dollar in state money counts, and even another $100k can make a difference. However, VA will be last in receiving any of the EEF and MSPGO monies.
To say nothing from the actuarial reports regarding pension expenses and liabilities the parish will incur in the coming year, or the reports regarding the forecasts of sales and property tax revenues. However, since the parish office is closed on July 4, he's waiting on their answer.
----------------------
Upon return from the parish radio station, the family gathers around the breakfast table but abstains of discussing EEF and MSPGO.
"Valerie, who do you feel is most likely to anchor VA's high school quiz bowl team this season?" Glen asks his daughter about something unrelated to college or mathletics for once.
"I'm not sure. Half the roster left last year, and the remaining players are nowhere near Anna's level. So maybe someone coming in from the middle school division's quiz bowl team, in which case Myriam could make the A-team, but Myriam is, again, not quite on Anna's level yet" Valerie answers her father to the best of her ability.
"Myriam? She's a mathlete, too... and even though several of our opponents proceed that way, the cold, hard truth is that stacking too many mathletes on a quiz bowl team is a recipe for disaster on the buzzer" Selena points out.
Archbishop Rummel and Captain Shreve used to proceed that way a few years ago, nowadays Iowa is the school that keeps stacking mathletes in quiz bowl. As a result, even Kinder, despite poorly performing themselves (and that Anna will undoubtedly bolster), was able to beat Iowa at various quiz bowl tournaments last season.
"If Myriam was to play quiz bowl, is there a debater that could balance it out?" Glen asks the two of them.
"Daisy once told me that, even though debaters often have weaknesses in math, there are no guarantees that, if you were to get a debater to play quiz bowl, they will actually be strong in anything other than math and science. We might have been able to make it work, but balancing a mathlete with a debater is a risky move at best" Valerie explains to her parents. "There might not even be a willing debater, and even then, that player would probably be a lazy Congress player or something"
"Enough of quiz bowl gossip. We need to seriously think about paying for college. While I'm glad that Dexter was able to graduate from Tulane debt-free, we need to ensure that it won't break the bank" Glen then sermons Valerie as they are about to start the college search process.
And Valerie is the kind of student for whom Ivies are realistic, provided that at least one letter of recommendation addresses the extracurricular rationing. On any given year, at most a half-dozen kids in the parish could realistically aim for higher than Tulane, and the last class was the most numerous and gender-balanced in that respect, Glen muses while Valerie starts writing her essay about what made her feel like using people to further her own ends was unacceptable, while remaining mindful that she must stay within 650 words.
----------------------
Once Valerie is reasonably confident of the tone of the content, she uses her AI-powered proofreading tool before she could have the essay read by her parents for tone.
"For the sake of equity, and for keeping true to my word, we will stick to the same budget we paid for Dexter, and we'd then pay the same amount we did in 2023 dollars for your brother, adjusted for inflation, for you" Glen then tells his daughter.
"I wonder if failing to make the EGMO or IMO would penalize me that much... sure I should still be able to attend Tulane or something, but on the other hand, female multi-MOPpers are very rare" Valerie laments about what she considers the core of her application.
By then she already has an idea of what schools to target: MIT, Carnegie Mellon, Caltech, Stanford. Cristiano made it into CMU with one USAMO appearance, but he had quiz bowl rather than band. And he was Hispanic, which I am not. We have no real history at MIT, Valerie tries to think of past VAs' college decisions, mathletes or otherwise, knowing that, if anyone aimed for Ivies or equivalent (excluding Tulane, even though, at least to the VAs' eyes, Tulane may as well be an Ivy equivalent) they will stick out like sore thumbs. And yet, these were usually the kids who star on any of the academic teams.
"Two more things: how much did this trip to Shadyside cost us, and how much did you pay for Dexter?" Valerie asks her father.
"Even though my health insurance covers the whole family, my health insurance doesn't cover as much for dependents than it does for myself, and psychiatric emergencies aren't covered to the same extent. So we're still forced to spend about fifteen hundred bucks for this hospital trip at MOP, and that's just your hospitalization. We're down three grand because of this medical emergency, you worried us to no end" Glen explains to her, while he is pulling out the old tuition bills for Dexter at Tulane on his computer.
If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.
Valerie quickly realizes that, even when adjusted for inflation, her parents paying the same for her education as they did for Dexter, in 2023 dollars, doesn't mean the same, especially not when the tuition of places such as MIT, Carnegie Mellon, Tulane and Caltech increased faster than inflation.
"Let's run the net price calculator. I guess I need to have our tax returns on hand, and then we will know whether these schools are realistic for you to attend. Please keep in mind that, in general, out-of-state public schools have very poor financial aid for out-of-state students so, as tempting, say, Berkeley or Michigan could be, we can't afford that. If you want to go out-of-state, stick to the private schools. For every school you could consider, please note the net attendance price, but please don't consider it a final price" Glen sermons his daughter while preparing a spreadsheet with all the common financial information requested on colleges' net price calculators to supply her so she can do it on her own going forward.
That means house prices, income and fiscal situation. And she is surprised that, even though the family income is much higher than the $100k threshold under the debt-free Louisiana Promise at Tulane, she can still hope for financial aid at, say, MIT, Caltech, Stanford or Carnegie Mellon. Just not necessarily a full ride or close to it. But it was because these institutions were reaches for everyone often attracting children of the wealthy.
"In terms of safety, if you don't apply to Tulane in early action, I hope you're comfortable with LSU. There are far worse kids who go there, but if you get unlucky – I will be honest, even with you having gone to MOP twice, and all of what that implies, coupled with band and Four-H volunteering, as well as any tutoring and the organization of the Venomous Agenda Classic, even if Trent or anyone else writing letters of recommendation for you addressed the extracurricular rationing in place at VA – MIT, Caltech, Carnegie Mellon and Stanford will be gambles, better LSU than nothing, and you may only ED at one, so do your research, apply to LSU and EA to Tulane, then pick which one to ED at" Glen gives his instructions to his daughter.
Past VAs were encouraged to apply under early decision if they were aiming for Tulane or higher. That might concern a handful of students, but even after Glen decided there was nothing more I could do, he's still stressing me out, Valerie reflects on how this rite of passage has been lived by other VAs in the past. Sometimes I wish Tulane was perfect for me, in which case I would not need to endure these high levels of stress any longer... but it's not. There may be several colleges who might be good fits for me but it's not that great in STEM disciplines.
"It seems like it's a bit early in the timeline to start thinking about these things" Selena laments to Glen about how he treats Valerie.
"Try to imagine how it would be if Valerie was attending, say, Benjamin-Franklin, Bâton-Rouge or Caddo Magnets, and the parents of these kids... I used to teach at some New Orleans school but then came Katrina; our home was destroyed, and I came here because the parents wouldn't be nearly as unpleasant"
"Yet you act like one of those parents you hated so much as a teacher in New Orleans!"
To Glen's eyes, the main difference is that here, in rural southwest Louisiana, parents don't seem to push their kids to do activities the kids don't want to do just because it looks good for college applications, and often kids who take part in academic teams at parental insistence don't perform so hot and don't have the best morale.
Yet Valerie was a case of a kid who was enthusiastic about mathletics at first, in middle school, but as high school went on, parental expectations and vicarious attempts to redeem themselves from their own failures made her sour but powerless to act.
----------------------
The following day, at the parish school district's administrative office, Glen then receives a few key documents that will prove crucial to complete the budget. Actuarial projections to plan for cash outlays for staff pensions, property value forecasts and finally, the legislature's response to their grant requests under MSPGO and EEF. An ecstatic Glen then reads the numbers carefully: $300k in MSPGO money, another $200k in EEF money. That's $400k more for the parish than under his predecessor for last year, for which there was no EEF money and only $100k in MSPGO money.
"A-ha! Making VA's mathletics what they are today is paying off for the rest of the parish! The legislature gave us four hundred grand more to bridge the math and science gaps across the parish! We needed more than just test scores and passage rates for symptoms of not only educational issues, but also inequality in these!" Glen exclaims in front of the other people he had on hand to help him prepare the budget.
"One percent increase in the per-capita amount of the MFP, and enrollment is projected to remain stable" the parish school district's comptroller then points out before delving in the more specific details of the property taxes and the pension costs.
One percent increase in MFP funding isn't much, about $375k, but better than nothing. However, the pension costs also go up by one percent. With the extra $400k in state money, and assuming sales taxes go up by the inflation rate, where does that leave us? the comptroller thinks about what expenses are tied to inflation and which ones are not. All told, the parish school district has ~$1M more in revenue, and the time has come for the comptroller to review each line one by one, and there are dozens of them, most of which don't seem to change year-on-year much, except for those areas directly affected by the spending of EEF and MSPGO monies, namely curriculum redesigns and instructional materials outside of VA.
"But I'm afraid that the Venomous Agendas mathletic successes could stop, or decrease, when Salome graduates, so we have three years to make the MSPGO money count and cross our fingers that either Faith or Salome gets to the IMO in the meantime" Glen voices his concerns over MSPGO money.
"Sir, you know what that implies: we have three years to reduce the size of the gaps in math and science achievement between VA and the rest of the parish! And it all starts in elementary school, so we'll probably need to consult with the principals dealing in elementary and middle school before the EEF and MSPGO monies are spent!" the comptroller quips about what to do with these state monies.
"Or really, before the yearly parish budget is presented to the school board before it becomes effective. The local communities tend to be pretty inactive in this parish, and their concerns are relayed by the local principals" Glen then starts writing an email to all principals in the parish that only awaits the preliminary budget to be sent.
From my past experience with VA mathletics as a principal, I don't harbor much hope for Myriam Gency as a mathlete, since mathletes who do quiz bowl as well tend not to perform as well in mathletics as the "pure" mathletes, the Gens, Jennifers, Faiths and Valeries of this world. At best, Myriam would prove to be like Cristiano, Imélie or Marcia. But the long-term wildcard would be Blythe, Lacassine's middle school mathletics captain, and the co-winner of the Venomous Agenda Classic. if VA stops getting to the race to the IMO, or the EGMO, then I'm afraid we won't be able to get as much MSPGO money going forward, because it would weaken our case for MSPGO money, Glen keeps obsessing about the future of the parish's mathletic landscape.
"With all due respect, it's unrealistic to expect every school in the parish to get to even the USAMO, let alone the race to the IMO" the comptroller happens to have reviewed the parish's request for MSPGO funds, claiming that VA consistently getting a mathlete to the race to the IMO year in, year out is a symptom of disparities in STEM instruction.
"More realistic is getting all high schools in the parish to the AIME" Glen then changes course a little bit. "With that said, I'll send out a memo to get all the principals of the parish for a meeting here in Jennings for the budget"
And, of course, the parish's school budget would then be for the benefit of all, a satisfied Glen then sends out the memo to the principals, some of whom can thank VA mathletics for getting them money for much-needed lab equipment and supplies.