End of an Era

After two and a half years, Ood Bnar has resigned from his position as Praetor to the Headmaster. He has been a constant presence on the Shadow Academy staff for a decade, most recently as Praetor to both myself and my predecessor, Solari, and as a professor or eclectic pedagogue (a fancy phrase for "nerd teacher") prior to that. He was also an Envoy back when that was a thing (look it up!).

I have no idea how many exams he has graded in all of his time on this staff, but I think it's safe to say it numbers in the thousands. Beyond that, he has touched every single course currently on offer, plus many more that have been retired. As Praetor, he helped craft SA policies and projects like the SA Society, the degree program, and the Novitiate Hall. He's also been quick to step up with new ideas or to help cover for staff (myself included) who need to take some brief time off. He's picked up some pretty nice trinkets for his SA work along the way, including a Ruby Scepter, a Sapphire Blade, and his promotions to EQ3 and EQ4.

Thankfully, Ood's resignation is not total: he is staying on as a Special Magistrate to the Headmaster, and will play a role in helping to train his replacement. His other tasks as Special Magistrate will include helping to fix markdown errors in SA courses and organize the SA file system. He may work on the odd substantive project or two as well.

If you see him around Telegram, please thank him for all of his hard work towards making this club a more interesting, informative, and helpful place.

I'm so lonely

With Ood stepping back into a more relaxed role, I am in need of a new Praetor. My Praetor will essentially have the same duties that I have, which can be found (more or less accurately) on the wiki. The job primarily involves:

• Conceiving or reviewing proposals for new courses
  
• Writing and editing new courses along with other SA staff and course developers
  
• Ensuring existing courses remain up-to-date (and this will be a major task for 2016 and beyond with the new movies and any changes to DJB canon)
  
• Overseeing the professors and docents (and helping select replacements)
  
• Reviewing the structure of the SA departments
  
• Grading exams that exceed the 24 hour grading window
  
• Periodically reviewing the SA Society for changes
  
• Maintaining the degree system
  
• Managing the magistrates
  
• Anything else that we may do in the future!
  

I expect my Praetor to be able to fill in for me on almost anything when I am away. If you think you're up for the job, send me an application no later than 11:59pm EST, January 23. There's no particular format required, but be sure to explain your interest in P:HM specifically, and detail any plans or ideas you may have -- I'm very interested in your ideas for ways to improve the SA. I reserve the right to select a Praetor prior to the application deadline, but I intend to think very carefully about my choice and therefore I don't expect to make a selection until the end of the month.

ALSO! I am making changes to my magistrate system. Up to this point, I've hired only long-term M:HMs with very general duties. Starting today, I'm going to hop on the term-limited magistrate bandwagon. Qormus has served ably as M:HM for several months, but his slot is now open for applications. This will be a six-month term starting as soon as I hire someone and ending mathemagically six months later (roughly). The duties will include:

• Grading late exams (sitting in queue past 24 hours)
  
• Writing and editing course notes and exams, including both new courses and course revisions
  
• Auditing old courses! With so many structural and canon changes, many of our current courses are at least slightly inaccurate or out-of-date, and I'm reviving the lovely audit to fix it.
  

This is a test run and we'll see how it goes. I expect there will be some changes when I select a new P:HM, but more on that will follow. If you're interested, send me an application no later than 11:59pm EST, January 16. You can apply for both M:HM and P:HM in the same application, if you'd like.

Farrin will remain as M:HM for the rest of this month; look for the second M:HM slot to open up in my next report.

Courses and such

I've been fixing course notes and exams as people make me aware of errors -- please continue to send these changes to me! Also, I've made a minor change to the Maven and Savant Philosophy degrees: all five Order COREs are now required for the Savant; any three of the five are required for the Maven.

Finally, I'm going to get to work grading the DJB Episode VII Celebration! trivia event today!

Top Exam Takers!

Since my last report, the top five exam takers at the SA are:

Name	# of Exams	# of Academic Credits
Hunter Areticus Altainatus	47	88
Neophyte Mij Nosliw	34	33
Acolyte Lo-Kain Vamielaga	32	32
Neophyte Aen Van Del	27	21
Neophyte D'Cota James	27	31

At Evant's suggestion, I've added the # of Academic Credits earned by each of the top five, which gives some indication of the work required to complete the courses taken (e.g., all Novitiate Hall courses give zero Academic Credit). Great work, everyone!

Conclusion

As always, I'd like to close this report by asking for your help. The SA is a massive wall of text that covers ever-shifting topics and is prone to typos and run-on sentences. If you spot substantive or grammatical problems, please let me and the course PROF know so that we can fix them ASAP. As we work through the Departments during the audit, we're also going to be asking for help reading and editing -- if you have any particular expertise, let us know when we announce the next Department being audited. There are shiny things available. :P

Bubba

Adept Dacien Victae di Plagia
Headmaster of the Dark Jedi Brotherhood