Chapter 267: Chapter 260: Dark Horse
“Such errors are impossible for the school to make,” Lin’s father shook his head. “It’s simply inconceivable. Class Five is the cream of the crop of our school, everyone knows that.”
Class One was just as infamous as Class Five, known mainly for being the class filled with problem students. Most had got in through connections and were therefore grouped together. The rest of the classes at this school were rather run-of-the-mill; they had a mixture of good and bad students, but no class could boast the overall quality of Class Five, nor the uniformly poor performance of Class One.
However, who would have expected that this year, Class One would turn out to be a dark horse? Their results wholly resembled those of the top tier class at our school. Their class not only secured the first, fifth and sixth position but also claimed over fifty percent of the seats in the top hundred. If we consider the seventy percent matriculation rate after the college entrance exam, it’s safe to say that at least half of Class One will be heading off to university. In fact, most of this top hundred are likely candidates for key universities.
The top ten students were even headed for high-ranking universities like Beijing University, Qing University, and Nanqing University. Hence, if their own Lele worked a bit harder and managed to get into the top ten ranks, she could also become a student at Nanqing University, Qing University, or Beijing University. Lin’s father wasn’t pushing her for this, though. He would be happy if she simply got into any university.
Lin’s father had booked a big table at a grand restaurant and invited three other families over. They had been meeting so frequently recently that they felt quite familiar with each other.
The three children spent time together daily, so close they resembled siblings.
Lin’s father was very happy, he kept toasting everyone, drank quite a bit, and started reminiscing about their struggles from the past few years.
Due to work, Lin’s parents usually had to travel leading to an often sick and frail Lin Yile being raised by her grandmother. Yile didn’t grow much and her academic performance was always poor. She was the weakest among her siblings which resulted in her being bullied frequently. Seeing their daughter in this situation would often make them feel sad.
Just like them, Chen’s father too used to worry about his child’s performance. He would punish his child whenever the grades were particularly low, resulting in his buttocks swollen from the beating, only to secretly cry afterwards. But what can he do? They all had just one child. If their child’s academics were not up to par, how would they live in the future?
Upon discussing this, these fathers felt like bursting into tears.
If both students and teacher showed such dedication, how could their academic performance not improve and grades not rise?
Just look at their grades. They’ve embarrassed countless people – the so-called best students of Class Five. Did Class Five have such good grades? Did Class Five have the student who ranked first? Did Class Five achieve such high overall scores?
Yet, Class Five still had the audacity to call themselves the top class. Yes, top class indeed – a class that didn’t even perform as well as one that consisted mainly of problem students.
And Teacher Song, always displaying a superior attitude, had undoubtedly angered many people.
There weren’t many people willing to lend a helping hand when one was down. But rest assured, there were plenty of people ready to kick you while you were down.
While Teacher Jin was conversing amicably with her colleagues, Teacher Song was receiving sympathetic glances everywhere she went. After all, was the performance of their so-called top class not indicative of the teacher’s incompetence?
Previously, the ‘Outstanding Teacher’ accolade had always been reserved for Teacher Song.
However, Class One’s outperforming everyone’s expectations in both the mock and final exams resulted in an unexpected turn of events. Moreover, every subject teacher was extremely fond of Class One’s students due to their excellent discipline and study habits.
So, the ‘Outstanding Teacher’ award was given to Teacher Jin this year. The school didn’t care if you were teaching the top or the problematic class; they judged solely based on results. Clearly, the problematic Class One had shown remarkable improvement, while the top Class Five didn’t show much difference. The alleged top students of this school, or Class Five, lacked any particularly outstanding student.
However, Class One had a few students who excelled in every aspect.
Finally, Teacher Jin was able to hold her head high in the entire school. Winning the ‘Outstanding Teacher’ award made her feel fulfilled, like a winner in life. As for Teacher Song, she missed out on an award that was practically hers by default. No matter how angry she was, she couldn’t change the exceptional cognitive and test-taking capabilities of the students in Class One. Remembering that those students were initially part of her class before she handed them over to Teacher Jin wasn’t just maddening, it was also suffocating.