This year, I wasn't able to physically see my report card until July 27th— when I came back home from my summer camp. Therefore, in order to find out my marks earlier, I had to ask my mom via Skype.
Of course, my mom would not just tell me my marks without some fun— she made me guess what I got in each subject. The problem was, it was extremely hard to guess because I had no idea how I did on the exams or the final projects! So I just guessed a bunch of random numbers that were close to my marks going into the exam, hoping that she would say "correct!" at one of those numbers.
However, she gave me no verbal response. Instead, she typed out three numbers: 97, 97, 98.
My heart sank. My biology mark before the exam was 96, and I knew that I didn't do too well on the exam; my biology mark couldn't have been higher than 96. So the three numbers that my mom typed must have been the marks for the three remaining subjects— advanced functions, data management, and economics. And I had a hunch that the 98 was for data management because its exam was very easy. So this meant that my advanced functions mark was merely 97.
Throughout the school year, I had given a lot of thought into my top six marks (for university applications), and I had figured that my advanced functions mark must be 99 or 100 in order for me to get a high enough average. A 97 was simply not enough!! I felt very sad at that moment, regretting that I didn't do well at all on the exam (I went into the exam with a 98.8).
Still, my mother wanted me to guess what my last mark was. She also made me guess which subjects the 97's and 98 belonged to. So I told her something similar to what I wrote in the last two paragraphs. However, to my surprise, I saw a weird number on my screen: 100!
I asked my mom several times whether she had made a typo. But no, she told me it was right. Suddenly, I thought of something unbelievable: my advanced functions teacher must have did something to everyone's mark! She said she was going to bell curve the marks, and it was also possible that she had lowered the denominator of the exam. In any case, I confirmed with my mother that the perfect mark was indeed for advanced functions, and started express my joy. I couldn't care less about how I got the 100 in advanced functions and 97 in biology. ( I later found out that my math teacher added three percent to everyone's mark, without bell-curving).
I was overjoyed for at least an hour.
Marks:
Biology: 97
Economics: 97
Data management: 98
Advanced functions: 100
