Hogwarts: The Next Generation

Professor’s Handbook
So, you’ve joined, created an adult character, and decided that you want to be a Professor. Excellent! We are always in need of Professors here, and we’re pretty flexible about what you are permitted to teach and the conduct in the classroom.

I know that being a Professor is a lot of hard work; I usually end up getting stuck with making lessons for all the positions not filled (as a sort of substitute professor, if you will). Since it can be a little confusing – and since I require certain things out of Professors – I have made this guide for any and all potential professors.

What Is Expected of Professors: Rules
Inter-Castle Relationships
It is frowned upon to have relationships with other Professors. But let’s face it – who else are you going to hook up with? An NPC? Although it is frowned upon, it is not a definite rule, meaning you can start a relationship with another Professor if you really want.

Professor-Student Relations
We like to keep an open mind at THF. If you want to strike up a romantic (or lusty) relationship with a Student, you may – under a few conditions. First, both the Student and Professor must both agree. Second, you must have permission from the Admins (a PM to Adana Phoenix requesting this will suffice). Lastly, this relationship must have some sort of effect on the current RP. If you plan on having your Professor sacked because of this, that would be fine – reporters would have a field day, it would make the school look bad, and an investigation would most likely start from the Ministry. But if you’re doing this solely because you want your 40-something Professor to hook up with a young, innocent (or not so innocent) teenager to stroke your character’s ego, then don’t bother.

Class Times
Every time we change RP times, a new class will be posted. Professors will be informed ahead of time when these time changes will occur, but you are encouraged to have your lessons prepared or mapped out ahead of time. If you cannot for some reason post a lesson when needed, please contact Adana Phoenix and alternatives will be worked out. These could include someone taking over the class for that single lesson, or having the Professor post two lessons the next time he/she is available.

House Points
Professors may give or take away up to 5 points for any one reason. A student may receive multiple points being awarded, but all point deductions or additions must have a legitimate reason for their being given or taken. For example, a Professor may award a single House 23 points in that lesson – as long as no more than 5 points were given to each student (if a student answers 2 correct questions, you may award their House 10 points) for any reason. This is because in order for these House Points to be legitimate, the Professor must post in the House Points topic, stating the amount of House Points given or taken, why, and who caused this.

Detentions
Any Professor may give a Student a detention. This student must have broken some kind of rules in order for this to be a legitimate detention. Detentions are only reported to the Admin if a student’s character does not reply to the topic for detention. That’s right – we RP your detentions here, and it is a requirement to attend if a student has broken rules. The character itself will not be in trouble with the admins; it is all in character (IC).

Quarters
Hogwarts Staff (with the exception of Neville Longbottom) all live in Hogwarts, on the Sixth Floor. Each Staff member has their own sub-forum serving as their rooms. Hogwarts Staff may do anything they please here (and if it is forbidden, then don’t get caught!). We still ask that any topics involving sexual content beyond kissing should be flagged and given an R or X rating in the topic’s description.

Steps In Creating Your Lessons & Other Duties
Introductory Topic
This should be a pretty simple topic in your office. It may be written as if it was a notice, or you may prefer to write it out like an RP post. You should mention that you are a Professor of So-and-so class, what you expect of all students, and what is required (in terms of books, mention the book title and author – make sure to reply to Flourish and Blotts to have your book added if you decide to make it up – and be specific if you require anything else, such as protective gloves, parchment, ear muffs, a work robe, wands, etc.). You may want to inform students of how you may be reached (PM, e-mail, or post in your office’s thread).

The Actual Lesson
Lessons can be done in two basic ways. One, you may post all necessary information in your first original post (which should be called the subject of your lesson with a topic description in the lesson’s number; for example, if you were a DADA professor, you would have a title of: “Bogart’s” and a topic description of “Lesson #4”). At the end of your first post, you could assign classwork and/or homework and mention if anyone has any questions about the lesson, feel free to ask now. Each student will post entering the class, answering to roll call (you don’t have to list each student enrolled; merely state that you are taking roll, and go on with your class), take notes, will post any questions, do class work, turn classwork in, and exit. The second way to post your class is to do it in stages, asking the class a question and leaving a gap for students to answer. This is the best way for students to win House Points, but also leaves more room for students to chat with each other and also good for discussions. It is up to the Professor to choose which way to conduct his/her class.

Homework
If the Professor feels they would like to assign homework instead of in addition to classwork (which is, in itself, optional, especially if you have had a class discussion or have a practical section), then feel free to do so. Professors must mention this in the first and/or last post, and possibly highlight it with a different font or color to make it stand out. All homework assignments should be submitted by PM, and given a grade. The professor should send back a PM with the grade to the student.

Grading
In each lesson, you will need to give a grade to each student who participated in your class lesson. If you have gone with the first style mentioned in The Actual Lesson, you may simply edit the post of that student and post their stats. It is a good idea to post the student’s homework grade (after they have submitted it) here, to keep track of everything easier. If you have gone with the second method, you may wish to list all the student’s stats in a single post at the end of the thread. Either way you do it, the following (preferably highlighted in a different color to stand out) should be filled out:

Each student are to post their full name, House, and year in their first post to identify themselves. They will be graded on a scale of 1-10, 10 being the best. Please keep in mind that we have RPers of all stages of writing (beginner, intermediate, and advanced), so try not to be too harsh on the RP score; it us ultimately up to the Professor to decide how many points out of 10 on each field that the student is awarded or deducted.

House Points
As mentioned in the Rules section, Professors may only award or deduct 5 points for any one reason. When the lesson is closed, please post in the House Points topic, stating how many points have been awarded or deducted to which House, why, and for whom this is done. The House Points topic is a RP topic, although since it is mainly one-way, a few sentences will suffice.

Ending A Lesson
A lesson ends right before the next lesson begins. Usually, lessons will extend during vacations in real-life since many people cannot or will not have access to the Internet or time to post during this period. This is perfectly all right. Any other time, lessons should be posted every Monday, meaning that Professors may choose to end a lesson Sunday, or on Monday (right before posting the next lesson). In order to end a lesson, you will need to post In Character (IC) and state class is over, and dismiss all students. After this, you should immediately lock the post and unpin it (only current classes will be pinned). Locking and pinning or unpinning topics may be done by using Moderation options at the bottom left of the window, below the last post.

Make-Ups
After ending your post, make your Make-Up post. This should be entitled (for example): “Bogarts” with a topic description of: “Lesson #4 Make-Up”. Make-Ups are only open until the time of the Test, in which they will be closed. For students who joined after a test has already been given, that test and lessons to go with it will not be counted in their final grade.

Tests/Quizzes
Every 4th lesson will be a quiz; which means you students will be tested on the contents of 3 lessons. The questions shall be posted in RP form by the Professor, but Students should not post in that thread; the Professor should put an out of character (OOC) note at the bottom of the post that all answers should be PM’d to the Professor. Grading will be done the same (except the RP section will be taken out and no House Points will be awarded or deducted) as a typical lesson. After the tests have been graded, send a PM to each Student informing them of their grade, and lock and unpin the topic before starting the next lesson. Now is the time to prepare the students’ report cards.

Report Cards
Report Cards are made after every test. All the professor does is add up the scores of each lesson and test and come up with a percentage and letter grade for the student. This is when posting grades in each lesson becomes very useful – all you need to do is copy and paste a student’s grade from each lesson, whip out a calculator (or use the computer’s calculator), and add up the scores! A new topic entitled “Report Cards” with a topic description of “Class” (example: “Defense Against the Dark Arts”) should be posted in your office and it should contain each student whom you have grades for. It should have the student’s name, House, year, and percentage for each area they are graded upon, and letter grade as a total.

Here’s an example Report Card:

Keep in mind that whether or not you assign classwork and/or homework will affect how many points the classwork and homework fields. For example, if you assigned classwork for each lesson, but only gave out two homeworks, then you would have a total number out of 20 for homework and a total number out of 90 instead of 100.

Questions & Answers
Where can I find a listing of all my students in my class?
In the Class Registry topic, all students should post what classes they would like to have. Some classes are mandatory, others are purely voluntary. Either way, there will be a listing of all available classes with their students in the first topic of the thread.

Some students didn’t post in lessons at all… should I fail them?
No. They may have taken a temporary leave of absence due to real life issues. If a student does not post, do NOT give them a 0/10 in their fields; rather, don’t add anything up at all. If they do post in lessons later, only grade the work they have done, not what they neglected to do.

What system do I use for grading?
We use the system from the books, and assign a percentage to each. Following is a list of letter grades:

How do I find the percentage of a Student’s grade?
After you have graded a student’s lesson(s), giving them a number out of 10, you take the first number and divide it by 10. For example, if a student has 7/10, 7 divided by 10 = .70 = 70% = P. This is applied to report cards as well, where there will be much larger numbers. For example, you may have 33/40. 33 divided by 40 = .825 = 83 (round up if the third digit is a 5 or higher, down if 4 or lower) = 83% = E.

How many lessons are there in a quarter, semester, and the year?
Each quarter will have 4 class sessions. There are 2 quarters in a semester. There are two semesters in a school year. In short, there will be a total of 16 classes. Only 12 of those have actual lessons, 4 are tests. There will be Christmas break, Easter break, and celebrations, such as the Halloween Masquerade and the Yule Ball.

Can I send a student who registered in my class a reminder to post in a lesson? Or ask why that students did not post in a lesson?
Yes, this is permitted. However, you should not harass the student; rather, state that they were listed in the class registry as being in your class, that they have not yet posted in the lesson, and you just wanted to remind them to do so in case they forgot. If you ask them why they have not posted, be kind and considerate; don’t attack or take on an accusing tone in your writing. Perhaps they merely forgot, or they just haven’t had the time. RPing is about fun, so try not to make posting in lessons a chore.

Will professors have to create different lessons for different years or just have all the years in the same room?

Just one lesson for everyone; we don't have enough members to do it the other way. Besides, that would be a lot more work. It's up to the professor to decide if they would like to give a basic lesson or a more advanced lesson. But I do ask that if the majority of your students are in their third year or below, please don't give them a seventh year lesson. It's not against the rules, but I would like lessons to be a bit more practical.

Also, no Forbidden Curses in the classroom, for any reason.