Issue #1 - May and June 2025

Chapter 1

Hello! I'm Mario Soriano, the local HiH honorary cheerleader. If you're active on our Discord server, you might know me for my cheery nature, my pathological oversharing or my hungriness for spreadsheets. I thought I could start doing a review of every two months in the site and look through the past achievements of our fellow students and professors, so we can later look back on how we've advanced. Since our website isn't too well suited for socializing and sharing updates with other people, I thought it would be fun to make some sort of newsletter to keep everyone posted on what's been happening arround the halls. Let's dive into it!

Professors and library

The month of May has been a rather quiet one. The library is now running smoothly, thanks to Miss Kensington's huge input. There is now a librarian application available, in case you want to join her. I've heard there will be Library Assistants in the future if the aforementioned position is filled, so stay tuned!

A new application for History of Magic professor has also opened. Please think twice if you're a good candidate for the position before applying. Remember it requires lots of responsibility and Headmistress Oshiro doesn't have the time to read 10 spam applications. Together with History of Magic, there are also two more subjects that are looking for a professor: Ancient Runes and Muggle Studies. Unless you're a miraculous writer, you probably don't want to apply unless you've finished at LEAST the first year of said subject, so don't be surprised if you don't receive an answer after applying with a total count of 10 points.

Herbology Year 2 temporarily allowed retakes after having some changes in the syllabus. Some extra credit projects were added, as well as a dandelion final project that was moved from Year 3. If you have any trouble finishing it, I'm sure Professor Aspen would be glad to answer your questions. He did with me, and it was very helpful.

Professor Rosenquist has put a PA application for Magical Art 601, for which applicants will need at least a 90% grade on average. Make sure to contact her if you have any doubts. The castle is always glad to see the grading team become bigger.

Professor Plumb has published Lesson 2 of Astronomy-401 five years after it was taking down so it could be rewritten. We're very excited to see what new knowledge this course will bring us.

Lastly, Years 4 and up for Care of Magical Creatures will be facing some changes in the next few months. Please be patient, since Professor Montclam doesn't have any PAs for these years.

Socials and the Discordian Castle

The Discordian Castle is doing better than ever! In May, we managed to reach 449 people, and the chat is more lively than ever. Points are being given left and right through a new channel called the Trophy Room, and a few students have volunteered to try and keep the conversation up in some of the classrooms through discussions. A special shoutout to 3rd Year Ravenclaw student Namikah Hunt (with the help of a few more students) for keeping the server bustling with answers every day.

However, everything changed in the third weekend of June. A TikTok regarding HiH obtained thousands of views in just a few hours and we received a new influx of students. Sources (mainly mine) report that nearly a hundred new students went over fifty points, and thirty more came back after years of inactivity. The Discord server earned nearly 200 new members!

As of June 29th, 2025, the introductory essay for FLY-101 is now extra credit: this seems to be an oversight that had gone unnoticed for years. This brought my average down to an 89, but I guess that's fine. :(

Both the Transfiguration (opened by Prof. Laurel) and the Magical Art (opened by Prof. Rosenquist) classrooms have been opened in these last few months within the Discord.

As a side note, you are welcome to join the Discord server (aka the Discordian Castle of Witchcraft and Wizardry). It's linked in the second most recent post in the newsroom, but if you don't find it, you're welcome to owl me and I'll show you which staircase you need to take.

Student achievements

However, when it comes to students, we've made as much or even more progress! Our top two students, Staraptor and Dane Lautner, have just earned over 100 points after pausing for a very long time. This is especially meritory in the case of people like them that have so much grading work and who are o high up in years. We're proud to call you our classmates.

The amazing Lily Lavender, Head Girl for DADA, has multiple achievements: she grades three years, has tons of points, is in Gryffindors' top 10 students and has numerous top 3 spots in the Grading Competitions. On top of all that, she's published lots of study guides that help both newer and senior students with their subjects (myself included), and this month she's published a guide to Divination Year 3. Make sure to check that one and all the others out!

Jean V. Ollivander has published a new chapter of her Guide to Surviving Hogwarts is Here. This time, she's ranked the Year Two courses by difficulty and has, once again, put into words what every older student would tell to newbies. If you're just starting Year 2 and don't know which courses to combine, check it out! Jean is such a cool human being and her tips are always the best. She's also a PA for two different courses, moderates the Discordian Castle, and has numerous winning spots in the grading and house point competitions. All of this in under a year! She was also the first person to welcome me into HiH after my very long hiatus, so thanks for that!

I wanted to mention some new students that have passed the 800 point mark in under a month! This is a huge achievement that sometimes takes years for students to achieve. These are Lucy (Ravenclaw), Amalia Selwyn (Slytherin), Garrick (Ravenclaw), Carla (Slytherin) and Alex Cane (Slytherin). Some of these students even managed to make it to Year 2! I think I speak for all of my fellow PAs when I say that we're very excited to see more perseverant first-years.

These two months, we've also witnessed the promotion of quite a few of our students. New Y2 students include Guii Black (Gryffindor), Alex Cane (Slytherin), Sunny Crane (Ravenclaw), Lilianna Edevane (Slytherin), Carla (Slytherin), Garrick (Ravenclaw), elsa (Ravenclaw) and Friedrich Lionhat (Ravenclaw). Moving onto Y4 are Will Bryce (Slytherin) and Tulip Karasu (Ravenclaw), and I've made it to Y3 as well.

Graduating in real time (in other words, once per year or more) are Will, Tulip, Alex, Garrick, Carla, Lilianna, Vinh Callahan (Gryffindor), Nia (Gryffindor), Friedrich, Leslie (Slytherin), Carmen Labonair (Slytherin), Anthea Hawthorne (Ravenclaw), Aurora Thompson (Ravenclaw), Emily Williams (Ravenclaw), Sophia Williams (Gryffindor), Ava (Slytherin), Linda Tost (Ravenclaw) and Jake Tildesley (Gryffindor). Congrats to you all!

PA milestones

We've got some new PAs this time around! Both me and Sophia Lestrade (Ravenclaw) have become Transfiguration Year 1 PAs during the month of June. We've got some older PAs renovating their contracts too: Tulip (CHRM/PTNS-301), Jean (CHRM-301), Will (HOM-301, CHRM-301/401, DIV-501/OWL) and Namikah (HOM-301, ASTR-101/201).

This month of May's grading competition has given the first three spots to Maya (Y4 Ravenclaw), Jean (Y3 Ravenclaw) and Andromeda (Y3 Slytherin). The month of June's grading competition was governed by Will, Maya and Andromeda. Let's give a round of applause for these wonderful students that manage to give us our grades back every week while tending to their own obligations! This time around it is even more impressive, especially knowing the influx of new students that has kept graders busy for at least a week.

House Points Competition

May's House Point Competition (a group which, by the way, has recently reached 500 members) was won by me, closely followed by Tulip and Jean. In June, it was won by Will, followed by Tulip and Guii. It's the first time I haven't placed in the top 3 in five months (in fact, this time I've placed sixth), and I couldn't be happier, because more competition means more people are excited to progress through courses and are inspired by other students' journey. I'd be glad to forward you the link to this competition as well. Everyone with over 30 house points is welcome to participate" I'm sure Professor Plumb would be glad to have you.