As the semester went on, topics for AP French assignments markedly increased in variety beyond simply being about history, culture and literature, as was the case for the first half. And the same held for the non-AP, too. Now reading lists for both her courses seem to cover more topics such as career development, financial literacy, and road safety. Parents seem to appreciate the changes made, too.
A few days after the finals for her two courses, near the end of the semester:
"Flo, don't forget about the Christmas dinner tomorrow!" Steven flashes past her while going to his office, and Flo going the opposite way, with the end-of-semester tests in tow.
"Sure, I will review the info about it one more time"
I might have reduced the weight given to history in the assignment topics, but sometimes I can't help but feel like Marianne would be more inclined to give me tenure at the end of the year if I do some stuff at functions outside of the classroom, and I do these well. Like the Christmas dinner. She said, on the invite, people are also invited to bring their own food and hence she would like at least some participants to cook some meals for others to eat. If her predecessor was still in office, I would only have had to worry about what goes the classroom and the debate team, nothing else, Flo then starts thinking about what she could possibly cook for the staff's Christmas dinner, knowing that she will need a lot more than if it was for herself and her parents only.
Which, after the school day ends, makes her go straight to Wal-Mart and shop for groceries as well as ingredients for the faculty dinner. She knows, however, that not everyone will bring meals in tow, only that she winds up meeting some of her colleagues there while shopping for ingredients. And that place is crowded, with people looking left and right for Christmas gifts to give to their loved ones. Or for ingredients to cook food so they can then host their own Christmas parties.
"Flo, what do you plan on cooking for tomorrow night?" a chemistry teacher asks her.
"I'm thinking about it, but time is short"
Knowing Flo, she would cook something from some French-speaking locale, but outside Louisiana. There's just so much to choose from even if she restricted herself to that, that chemistry teacher starts thinking about what she could cook, believing it's best not to cook the same things for the dinner.
Then Flo goes straight to the frozen foods section, looking for the cheapest bag of fries per unit of weight while keeping in mind the size of the meal she needs to cook. She then settles on a home brand 2-kilo bag of regular cut fries, before looking for vegetable oil, gravy and finally, shredded cheese since cheese curds are out of stock. And, of course, going to the self-service cashier station as soon as all the ingredients are on hand.
Upon returning home, she feels the rush to keep grading these finals, so that students can have peace of mind during the holidays. Speaking of grading, Flo's parents questions her during dinnertime about why she seems to be so busy poring over grading final French exams that she forgets about dinner:
"Dinner's ready!" Flo's parents yell at her.
"Ciboire! The sooner the final grades are posted for the semester, the better for all my students, and for me, too!" Flo retorts, while she is grading a final exam. "The long part of grading finals is providing the feedback when stuff isn't perfect: constructive is better. That will help the students when they get their copies back. I just want to finish the current copy"
"What do you mean, the sooner the final grades are posted, the better?" a parent asks.
"Let me put it this way: students feel stress over grades, regardless of subject. Some just shrug it off, others feel like something went wrong with themselves, others still just want to make sure they are on track towards a GPA target"
As far as my students are concerned, often goals requiring a certain GPA mean either remaining in good standing or they're after a certain level of TOPS money. I don't think it's a good idea to talk to my parents about that part of my job, it just doesn't interest them, Flo's train of thought shifts to kids' obsession with grades. This is what makes grading the least favorite part of my job.
After she finishes grading that particular copy, she eats with all speed and then spends the rest of the night grading more finals belonging to her own students. Apparently, she spends the following day at work grading more finals as well, making some progress, but with approximately 120 copies across 2 courses, by the time the last day of the semester ends, she is only halfway done with the grading.
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When the Christmas party arrives, after spending late afternoon in the kitchen that day, Flo arrives with 3 separate containers, because she didn't deem it appropriate to have gravy and cheese put on the fries until just before the time to eat comes.
Speaking of which, several staff members being different meals to the table: Warren, the quiz bowl coach and biology teacher, brought in salad, the chemistry teacher upon whom Flo came across the preceding day cooked gumbo, Marianne went in with fried rice, Steven arrived with chicken Kyiv, and so on, so forth.
"Welcome to the annual Christmas staff dinner. It appears that, this year, we have a variety of cuisines represented so don't be shy and eat whatever you like. Between the main course and the dessert, we will be playing a quiz bowl game, courtesy of our very own Warren!" Marianne outlines the early stages of the Christmas staff dinner before talking about the achievements of VA's student body over the semester.
And, with Marianne, doing this means that sports go first, but there wasn't a whole lot to celebrate when it comes to Venomous Agendas sports teams. However, for the non-athletic achievements, for some reason, FFA goes first, because of milk tasting. Then come, in that order, debate, quiz bowl and, of course, mathletics last. Apparently, she presented the achievements in ascending order of magnitude. At the end of this speech, Flo starts pouring the gravy and the grated cheese into the container full of fries.
Oh Trillian, the golden girl of the parish, in the race to the IMO... hopefully she will achieve what a number of past Venomous Agenda mathletes couldn't, Trent, the math team coach, seated at the other end of the cafeteria relative to Flo, starts thinking about his hopes for the math team going into the winter semester, before everyone starts getting what food they wanted out of the buffet.
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Speaking of buffet, so many took food they rarely had the chance to eat otherwise, leading Flo to take fried rice and chicken Kyiv. Yet, when Marianne comes across the poutine, she starts talking about it with Flo before eating:
"Poutine? Isn't that a Russian dish?" Marianne starts questioning Flo about it, just before helping herself to a serving.
"No, even though poutine may very well be served in Russia, it's not a Russian dish; rather, it's a Canadian dish" Flo explains to a confused principal.
"You see, there was no poutine anywhere near my old workplace, sorry" Marianne adds.
"Something's not right, Flo, about this poutine: while the fries and gravy are just fine, the cheese is a little... off" Steven comments about the poutine, while seated next to her.
"It's not my fault there just wasn't any cheese in curds available around here!" Flo defends her choice of cheese.
Then Flo's memories of her first time eating poutine in Quebec City, on her first day as a freshman at Laval University, resurface, and she couldn't help but to take a small serving herself. However, this means she must eat it first, lest the fries' texture would not be to her taste anymore and use the rice to absorb the gravy.
Yet, everyone else who ate poutine didn't seem to mind the cheese not being the same as on the real dish, and probably because some of them never ate any before.
When Marianne comes back to Flo's seat about twenty minutes later...
"How do you like the fried rice?" Marianne asks her.
"It's good, it's spicy but not salty at all. Which leads me to the question: are you on a salt-free diet?" Florence asks Marianne, suspecting that Marianne's health might have forced her hand into reducing salt as much as possible.
"Low salt, actually, but your gravy is a little salty, so I couldn't eat much poutine. What poutine I could eat, however, was good, too" Marianne comments on the poutine and diet.
However, the custodian is by far the biggest consumer of poutine. He then comes to Flo after he finishes the last of the poutine after everyone else ate their respective servings, a few moments later:
"Could you give me the recipe, please?" the custodian pleads with Flo, cell phone in hand.
"Keep in mind that the recipe calls for a different kind of cheese, but..." Flo then fiddles on the custodian's cell phone for the poutine recipe she used.
Then comes the turn to sign up to play quiz bowl. Flo, having played the game when she was a student, immediately rushes to sign up for it, while other staff members hesitate to play. Warren would ref the game(s) depending on how many people would sign up to play, but it would take at least 8 people to even get that phase to start.
When the eighth person finally signs up, after a lot of the staff decide not to play, the time comes for Warren to start forming the teams for the quiz bowl game. After explaining the rules and description of what quiz bowl is about.
"Florence, since you played for us at the HSNCT senior year, you will be given captaincy of team one" Warren announces to her, as she gets seated at the very front of the cafeteria once that announcement is made.
Flo also caused us to lose a key game at the HSNCT, too, Warren struggles to keep his mouth shut about this aspect of Flo's life as a quiz bowler, while keeping quiet about that aspect. He then tosses a coin to determine who goes first to pick people for their team, which would then proceed in a snake.
The other team captain, who goes first, sends shivers down Flo's spine when that person is called upon to make that team's last 2 picks, given the 3 people left who are still available to play. I feel fairly confident in myself and my players when it comes to the core subject areas of quiz bowl, but sometimes a good fourth player can make a difference, especially since sometimes an answer can come from nowhere. I'm curious about that other captain's experience in quiz bowl, Flo starts shaking in her seat when the other team captain starts making that team's choices. Once that is done, however, she has no choice but to take Steven as a fourth player.
"Next, please pick your team names" Warren warns both teams.
"What about Fighting Servers?" Flo throws her ring into her team's hat.
The other three accept pretty much instantly since the game is a novelty for them to play. However, the players Flo plays with all seem to follow VA quiz bowl to varying extents.
"The game is about to start. Tossup one" Warren starts the game.
Clues go on and, unfortunately, none of the players would be able to answer. The power mark is widely missed, and it goes into the later clues. When the first clue past the power mark is finished in full, Warren keeps reading...
"In cell metabolism, this process exists in two varieties: oxidative and substrate-level"
"Phosphorylation" the opposing science player buzzes in.
"Ten for the Nacho Royals. For ten points each..."
The Nacho Royals answer only one bonus part out of the 3. Then comes the second tossup, which is about a different field:
"Tossup two: The Serment du Jeu de Paume was taken during this following event in the early stages of the French Revolution" Warren reads the second tossup, while Flo buzzes in.
"Estates-General of 1789"
"Fifteen for the Fighting Servers. For ten points each..."
It becomes clear that most attendees are powerless over the questions, although not necessarily equally across questions. After all, it depends on the subject area of what each staff member knows.
But, as the game goes on, the lead is exchanged often, and, even though Flo is the best player of the Fighting Servers, they are somehow trailing by 20 points when the final tossup arrives, and the power mark is already missed:
"One of the characters of this book makes Hester swear her to secrecy about their marriage" Warren keeps reading the question.
"The Scarlet Letter" Steven buzzes in.
Florence gasps, when Steven hasn't buzzed in all game, and at the very last moment, he somehow does so.
"Ten. For ten points each, answer these questions on voter turnout issues..."
After two bonus parts, one of which is answered correctly, the game is tied going into the final bonus part. Everyone in the room seem to be on the edge of their seats, with the game tied with one bonus part to go, but Flo has memories of her HSNCT run flashing in her mind since it feels very similar to that very game she caused the VAs to lose back then. However, the stakes are much lower so she doesn't feel nearly as pressured as she was at the time.
"This phenomenon occurs when voters are either asked to vote often or to vote on too many issues"
"Voter fatigue" another teammate of Flo answers three seconds later.
"Twenty points for the bonus, and the winners are the Fighting Servers, two hundred eighty to two hundred seventy"
Marianne then shakes the hands of every player, followed by Warren, and, once that is done, Marianne approaches Flo and makes a proposal:
"Should Warren be, for whatever reason, temporarily unable to coach the quiz bowl team, you should, until such time the issue is resolved, coach the quiz bowl team" Marianne suggests.
"I already have a lot on my plate with coaching the debate team and my current teaching load" Flo vehemently protests. "Why should I be part of a contingency plan that fails to consider the workload of the people on it?"
"Yes, I'm all for a contingency plan for quiz bowl coaching, but if we overburden people, we risk making these people unable to do everything asked of them!" Warren adds to this chorus of complaints.
I'd really love to see whether Flo has actually addressed the core complaint about too much room devoted to history in her AP French course. I'd love to keep her. She might be a little whiny sometimes, though. However, at Wattpad High, there were just so few extracurriculars on offer that contingency plans for coaches could be implemented without issues, Marianne starts to feel like perhaps she asked too much of Flo.
"Warren, who do you believe would be a better fit to serve as a backup coach should you be, for any reason, unable to coach the quiz bowl team?" Marianne asks him, while he tries to think of who else could do it.
"I'll get back to you after the holidays" Warren then proceeds to draft a contingency plan for the quiz bowl team on his phone, missing only the name of the person tasked with implementing it if it's triggered.