As with all academic disciplines, the Classical Arts has its share of professional organizations. One of the most active is the American Classical League (ACL), the scholastic branch of which is the National Junior Classical League (NJCL). If memory serves, 48 states have an NJCL chapter, and in each of those 48 the local NJCL holds an annual conference for students and teachers to meet, greet, and compete. By some stroke of luck, we were allowed not only to join the NJCL but also to attend this year's conference, held in Clinton, MS.
We left on Friday at 11am for the 2:30 conference. I overestimated the time it would take to get to Clinton (also, our bus driver rolled along pushing 70 instead of the 55 I had thought was required by law). By 1:20 we were in Clinton but burned the extra time at the local Wal-Mart. When we drove back to the high school, my students mistook it for Mississippi College. The place was enormous. It was shaped like a cross, with one two-story hallway intersecting another. Above this intersection was a dome--an honest to god dome, with skylights in it--and when a person entered from the first floor he could see students passing overhead on a second-story elevated crosswalk that spanned the length of the central lobby. The students who had been so raucous on the bus were suddenly taciturn--as was I: we were all out of our element here. On a good day Simmons has 250 in attendance; we probably saw 250 students use the elevated crosswalk when the bell sounded.
We were escorted to the 150-person half-rotunda lecture hall with a raised stage where the NJCL conference was being held, and entered. I had not told my students that this would be a mostly white affair, so they were caught unawares when they entered and 80-odd pasty faces looked back at them. We were still 10 minutes early, so by the time the conference began and we had nervously slunk into a corner, the lecture hall was filled, with people sitting in the aisles as well as in the seats. Present were: Jackson Academy, Jackson Prep, Marshall Ridgeland Academy, Madison Central, Ridgeland High, Oxford High, the Veritas School in Jackson, The School for the Performing Arts in Brookhaven, Clinton High school, and the seven of us from Simmons.
The first item on the agenda was a friendly Quiz Bowl. Four students from each school were to face off against another school. Two schools who knew the regulations were slated to go first, and I volunteered my kids to compete in the second round--they were petrified, being around so many strange people, but I wanted to see at least 4 of them find the courage to get up there and do their best. When the quiz bowl started and the clock started ticking, one of my students touched me on the shoulder and said, "Mr. Walker, I've never been this nervous in my life. My heart is beating so fast and I can't make it stop." All seven were in various stages of queasiness, so I decided to take them on a tour of the school to calm their nerves. After 10 minutes of walking, we returned just in time to hear, "Simmons High School, take your seats."
The long and short of it is that we got plastered. Out of 9 questions, we lost 5 to 2. With that said, all of the questions were on either Roman history or mythology, subjects which I hadn't taught to my students yet. This conference itself was but a preparation for the National Latin Exam in March, and as the NLE focuses primarily on grammar and translation, I taught what was most important. Nevertheless, they got 2 questions right and had the courage to compete in front of everyone.
After the quiz bowl, we moved from the lecture hall to the auditorium where the students took a series of individual tests in the different areas of the classics: Grammar and Translation, Vocabulary, English Derivatives, History, Mythology, Private Life and Customs. Some tests had two sections, a Latin I and Latin II test; others had a single version. Each test was 50 multiple-choice questions. Students could take more than 1 test, but time was limited. After the individual tests, the students played basketball and ate pizza while the teachers graded the tests. Awards were given for placing 1st, 2nd, or 3rd in an individual test.
I told all of my seven to take the Latin I Grammar and Translation test since that was information that they knew and were prepared for. Six of them did; one, for reasons known only to himself and his Creator, took the Latin II Grammar and Translation test. Some of the six took a while; others turned it in almost immediately. To belatedly make a long story short, out of the 50-odd people who took this Latin I Grammar and Translation test, out of the 50-odd people from JA and MRA and the Veritas School and the Level 5 Public Schools and the $6k a year private academies, out of the schools with established Latin programs and established Classical Traditions, the placing broke down as follows:
Xavier Smith, Junior, Simmons High - 3rd place
Alexis Brown, Sophomore, Simmons High - 1st place
In other words, of all the students in Mississippi who are taking Latin I, Alexis Brown is the one who knows the most about the grammar of Latin and about the turning of Latin passages into comprehensible English. For good measure, Ulysses White placed 5th in the Latin II Grammar and Translation test. If he had taken the correct test, we could have swept the awards.
This result is doubly sweet: first, it serves as a well-deserved prize for these two students who have tirelessly labored over Latin's jumbled syntax and daunting vocabulary; second, it justifies the reason I joined MTC in the first place.
The horse I'd chosen to ride for the past two years was the one that said there were exceptional students everywhere who, given the opportunity and support, could match the achievements of any more socially-privileged students. Until now, I had only rhetoric, sentimentality, and best intentions. Now I have proof.
Again, just to restate what happened: In the competition of all the most privileged students in the state of MS with all their built-in advantages, Alexis Brown--being raised by a grandmother in a know-nothing Delta town--came out on top.
