Muggle-borns and Hogwarts letters (was; Colin's camera)

[jodel at aol.com]

No: HPFGUIDX 42434


In a message dated 8/10/02 7:59:51 AM, "rosie" writes:

<< New idea: Harry didn't get the full Muggle introduction to Hogwarts 
because he was not Muggle-born and his adoptive family (Petunia) were meant 
to know about the WW. Perhaps if you are truly Muggle-born like Colin, you 
get someone coming to your house (bit like Hagrid's visit to Harry) to talk 
to you and your parents, you get to write to someone and ask lots of 
questions, you get more detailed information about the castle and so on.  >>

Not such a new idea. I've been pushing it for the past year. I think that in 
the case of Muggle-born students, the owl letter is actually hand delivered 
by an employee of the Ministry department that oversees Hogwarts. This 
representitive explains the situation (and later obliviates the family if 
they refuse to allow the kid to attend) and makes an appointment to give them 
a tour of Diagon Alley to set up a Gringotts account and/or purchase school 
suplies. 

What is more, I think that in order to avoid a situation where every rep is 
out of the office on assignment at once, these hand delivered Hogwarts 
letters are delivered in the week before the child's 11th birthday regardless 
of when during the year it occurs. If this is the case, then children whose 
birthdays are early enough to have just missed the cut-off date to have 
attended the year before they actually started at Hogwarts (like Hermione) 
are given anything up to nearly a full year in which to prepare themselves 
for the changes in their lives. Which would go a long way towards explaining 
how a child of such natural gifts, but no magical backgroud, as hermione 
should be so VERY well prepared once she actually DID board the Hogwarts 
Express.

-JOdel