Originally posted to Tumblr on 5th-8th August 2024.
Thinking about this AU and what might have happened if Nicholas had never taken up the fencing scholarship at Kings Row that year made me wonder: who was the recipient of the fencing scholarship last year?
I mean, when Harvard is showing Nicholas to his dorm room he says this:
"We" here could refer to Kings Row as a whole, but that seems bizarre, that there would be only one scholarship student of any kind per year. Besides, "you won't feel out of place" suggests that Nicholas would be in good company as a scholarship student among the fencers (not just in the school). (One scholarship student per year among the whole school would definitely lead to feeling out of place).
But since we know that the fencing scholarship student has to make the team, who could it have been last year?
Aiden clearly has enough money that he wouldn't need a scholarship. Harvard seems well-off too, and if he were also a scholarship student, that would definitely be relevant to bring up in a conversation like this. Kally we know is a scholarship student, but he's an academic scholar, not a fencing scholar. And if it were Tanner, again, you'd think that would come up - since everyone made a big deal about Nicholas and Kally being "the two scholarship students", if Tanner were a scholarship student, that would have been mentioned.
But that doesn't leave any more team slots for a fencing scholar. So, was the scholarship not awarded to anyone? Or maybe the fencing scholar didn't make the team (ouch ><)?
Dwelling on this made me think about how tough it is to require the scholarship recipient to make the team in order to keep their scholarship. I mean, it does make sense - academic scholars have to demonstrate academic excellence; sports scholars need to demonstrate sporting excellence. And how do you demonstrate excellence? By making the cut for the team.
But at least good academic performance is only dependent on you. Getting good grades doesn't require someone else to get bad grades, and if another person gets really good grades, that doesn't make your good grades go away. It's not a zero-sum game.
Whereas there are only four slots available on the fencing team, and that means that you as a fencing scholarship recipient only need to be outperformed by four other students to lose your slot. In a school where most of the other students will be older and more experienced than you, that's a pretty harsh requirement.
(It also makes me wonder if you need to make the cut for the team every year in order to keep the scholarship. Surely not, right? But then, as an academic scholar, if your grades slip, you're in danger, so... the same applies to a hypothetical fencing scholar...
But then that means that between freshmen, sophomores, juniors, and seniors... you would need a fencing scholar to take up every single slot on the team.
How does this scholarship work??? someone give me the answers)
#Maybe I'm missing context about how US high school scholarships are awarded? #But again I'm just coming back to the 'we take one scholarship student per year...' #Either that does refer to fencing scholars in which case everything I've outlined above would have to be true #Or it's JUST one scholarship student per year in the school which... doesn't make any sense
Addendum:
I was re-reading volumes 1-3/the team try-outs arc and was struck by how multiple characters make a big deal of the fact that Nicholas is only a freshman (and therefore can’t be expected to do well/fence older, more experienced opponents).
Now, I did make a similar point in my original post (talking about how making the team is a tough ask when most of the other fencers would be older and more senior than you), but - Nicholas is also a fencing scholarship recipient, and so he has to make the team. So, this makes me wonder if it’s rare for a freshman to be offered a scholarship? Can a scholarship be awarded to an older recipient (maybe if they transferred partway through high school? Idk)?
If not, then… obviously a freshman scholarship recipient would have to “fence against the tallest, oldest seniors” (because everyone trying out for the team has to fence everyone else who tries out) and “ma[ke] it this far with only two losses” - otherwise they wouldn’t be in with a shot of making the team and would lose their scholarship.
Or is it rare for a freshman to succeed at making the team and thus keep their scholarship (which would be… kind of depressing)?
Seiji is of course a freshman too, but he’s considered an exception to the “rule” that a freshman has it tough trying to make it onto the fencing team, since everyone already knows that he excels at a national level. Nicholas is meant to be more of a “typical” fencer, even though we know he does have raw talent on the level that Seiji has but without the extensive training.
So the only conclusions that I can come to here are that it’s rare for a freshman to receive a scholarship (which makes the “one per year” comment from Harvard confusing, unless the scholarship is being regularly offered to older students) or that it’s rare for a freshman to make the team and keep their scholarship, which is sad.
Wait, I missed one:
So now I’m just ??????
I wondered whether Kings Row’s fencing scholarship could be a new scholarship and so it hasn’t ever been awarded before - maybe Sally Williams came up with it for Nicholas? But then I remembered Harvard’s comment about taking one scholarship student per year… So that wouldn’t tally. Unless he’s talking about scholarships of every kind??
(I like how confident Seiji is that he will be the exception to the rule about freshmen. He’s not wrong, but if he can be special, why doesn’t someone else get to be special? xD)
#witness me progressively losing my mind as I try to logic this incredibly minor detail of the FENCE worldbuilding