[HPforGrownups] Is education a right or a privilege in WW?

[Shaun Hately]

No: HPFGUIDX 102975

On 25 Jun 2004 at 19:27, manawydan (Ffred) wrote:

> 1. Does the fact that Muggleborns and aristocrats are side by side at the
> same school foster the "Them and us" attitude among the "pure blood"
> faction? Bearing in mind the size of Hogwarts compared to the size of the WW
> and the fact that the number of Muggleborn children is pretty insignificant,
> might this be so?
> 
> 2. Conversely, does the fact that all Muggleborn children go to an elite
> school of Witchcraft and Wizardry give them a higher relative profile in the
> WW by virtue of the fact that they are more likely to end up in visible
> positions as adults? Could this also feed anti-Muggleborn prejudice?

This idea, raised, by Ffred got me thinking. The following 
is kind of, thinking aloud, so it may be a bit disjointed - 
I'm wrestling around the edges of an idea here, I'm not 
really editing it to make it clear yet.

Now, it's my view that we are seeing a Wizarding World where 
there are significant variations in magical ability, and 
these impact whether or not a person is accepted for entry 
to Hogwarts.

For the purpose of later discussion, I want to consider two 
ideas here. The idea of a MQ (or Magical Quotient), and the 
idea of a MP (or Magical Power).

MQ would be similar to the original idea of the IQ score. As 
many people are probably aware IQ scores used to be 
calculated on a principle of 'Mental Age' divided by 
'Chronological Age' multiplied by 100.

So a 10 year old child with a Mental Age of 14 would have 
had an IQ of 14/10 X 10 = 140.

(IQ scores are no longer calculated in this way - although 
many books still say they are, and for roughly 95% of the 
population scores calculated using the newer methods are 
very similar to those using the old).

The major strength of the idea of an IQ score - and 
therefore an MQ score - is that theoretically it should stay 
fairly stable over a persons life. Someone with an MQ of 140 
at age 5 should still have an MQ of 140 at age 10 - even 
though those two scores represent a considerable difference 
in power.

So, for the sake of argument let's just assume that there is 
an MQ score in existence that works in a similar way to the 
IQ score (or rather the way IQ scores work on paper). The 
average MQ is 100, and roughly 95% of *relevant* people fall 
between MQ of 70 and 130. 

Also for the sake of argument, let's develop an MP score - a 
Magical Power score. This, unlike the MQ score is an 
absolute score - it does increase as you get older. *This* 
is the score relevant for Hogwarts entry.

A persons 'mental age' tends to increase until around age 
chronological age 22 (according to the theories used in IQ 
tests). Just for the sake of argument, let's assume that 
'Magical Power' increases until around the same age.

Let us also assume that MP = Chronological Age x MQ (or 
conversely MQ=MP/Chronological Age)

What this means is that an average 11 year old wizard or 
witch with an MQ of 100, will have an MP of 1100.

I hope I'm clear so far. 

Now, I've expressed the view that I think Hogwarts is a 
fairly exclusive school with minimum standards for entry, 
above the mere requirement that a child be magical. I base 
this on two *main* pieces of evidence.

(1) Neville's statement in Philosopher's Stone that his 
family were worried, even after he'd demonstrated some 
natural magical ability, that he was not magical enough to 
get into Hogwarts.

(2) Less clear, but the fact that Hogwarts is apparently the 
only Wizarding school in Britain, and even if it has a 
thousand students, doesn't really seem large enough to 
support the education of all of Britain's Wizard children 
given the apparent size of the Wizard population as seen in 
the novels.

These are just 2 points - but I don't really want to go into 
that issue in detail in this post.

Suffice to say, I am basing this post on the assumption that 
Hogwarts is not open to all children in Britain merely 
because they have *basic* magical ability. More than just 
the basics is required.

In terms of the MQ and MP ideas mentioned above, a certain 
MQ and MP score are required for Hogwarts entry.

For the purposes of discussion, we need to set an 'entry 
score' for Hogwarts. Just for the purposes of this 
discussion, I've decided to assume that the MQ required to 
enter Hogwarts is a score of 111.

This number is arbitrary, but I haven't just pulled it out 
of nowhere at all. For want of any other information, I've 
decided to use an MQ score at the 75th percentile simply 
because this was approximately the standard used in Britain 
during the days of widespread use of the 11+ test to 
determine who could go to a grammar school. If I'm assuming 
a minimum standard for access to a selective school of 
wizardry in Britain, it seems that using the standard that 
was once generally applied for entry to a selective school 
in the Muggle world is as good a starting point as any. 
[Obviously in the case of Muggle education, things were 
further complicated by the existence of independent 
schools].

What this score would mean is that the top 25% of 'wizard 
children' in Britain would qualify for Hogwarts entry - 1 in 
4. That matches, historically, the number of people Muggle 
Britain considered needed a full high-standard secondary 
education for much of the twentieth century. But the 
standard has been set here primarily because I need to base 
my numbers on *something*. I could have made other choices.

For the purposes of this discussion, I'm going to further 
assume that Neville's family were right to be worried about 
his chances of getting into Hogwarts. I'm going to assume he 
has an MP score of 112 - a shade over the minimum standard 
required.

[Note - it must be stated here that MQ must be only part of 
the standard for success at Hogwarts. Conventional IQ - 
intelligence - obviously plays a part in a students success 
as well. But I think MQ is the determining factor for entry 
- otherwise its hard to explain Goyle].

Using the formula for MP above, this means that Nevilles MP 
at various ages would be as follows.

Age      MP
1 112
2 224
3 336
4 448
5 560
6 672
7 784
8 896
9 1008
10 1120
11 1232
12 1344
13 1456
14 1568
15 1680
16 1792
17 1904
18 2016
19 2128
20 2240
21 2352
22 2464

If an MQ of 111 is required to get into Hogwarts, that would 
mean an MP of 1221 on a child's eleventh birthday. Using the 
scores I've chosen, Neville qualifies but only just.

Now, we know that Neville first showed a sign of spontaneous 
magical ability at the age of 8 (ie, sometime between his 
8th and 9th birthday). And while this delighted his family, 
they still weren't sure that he would get into Hogwarts.

Simply because it's a convenient number, let's assume that a 
person needs to have an MP around the 900 mark to show 
spontaneous magical talent.

What this means is that maybe in the Wizarding World, 
families understand the idea of 'benchmark' standards. It 
may be understood that if a child shows signs of spontaneous 
magic before the age of 8, he's almost certain to get into 
Hogwarts - but if he doesn't show it until the age of 9, 
it's almost certainly too late.

So Neville, first showing signs of spontaneous magic between 
age 8 and 9 is right on the borderline. On the plus side, 
the fact that he has done it before he is 9 means they know 
he is at least average - he's not a squib or anything close 
to it, and that has to be a relief. But it means he may not 
quite be Hogwarts standard - and they have to wait and see.

Now using these numbers, what is a Squib?

Perhaps a squib is somebody with inherent wizarding ability 
who will never reach that 900 level of MP. That would equate 
to a MQ of 41 or so - very rare indeed - only about 1 in 
9,000 wizards would be 'true squibs'. There could also be 
'near-squibs' - say adult wizards with an MP of between 901 
and 1200 (just below the level of the minimum standard of a 
starting Hogwarts student - who we know can learn basic 
spells. That would mean an MQ of 55 or under - or about 1 in 
400 wizards. This could be the group KwikSpell's basic 
courses are marketed at - with practice they can perhaps 
master simple spells - but it was never considered 
worthwhile teaching them?

Now to the question of Muggle-borns - the idea that perhaps 
they do automatically get into Hogwarts, even if Wizards 
don't is an interesting one that certainly hadn't occurred 
to me. I suppose it's possible. But I don't think it's 
*necessary* and I'd like to use MQ to explain why it might 
not be.

A fully powered adult Wizard (over 22 years of age) with the 
minimum entry standard for Hogwarts (MQ 111) would have a 
full adult MP of 2442.

We have some examples of very young wizards using magic - 
two year old Kevin at the World Cup using Daddy's wand to 
inflate slugs for example. An average Wizard child of that 
age would have an MQ of 200. So perhaps 200 is the minimum 
ability needed to operate basic magical devices - wands 
included - so they do something. It may be that the child 
has little control over what it does. But they can do 
something.

Now - perhaps exposure to magic makes it easier for 
spontaneous magic to occur. If a person has an MP score of 
900 (minimum for spontaneous magic) perhaps that only 
expresses itself if they have had a chance to use basic 
magical devices or have lived in a magical environment. 
Neville lives in a Wizarding family. Harry did for the first 
year of his life. Both of these do have spontaneous 
incidents in their childhood.

Perhaps, though, Muggle borns with only limited power don't. 
Perhaps if you're not in a magical environment with the 
opportunity to use magical items, you need a much higher MP 
to ever do spontaneous magic, let alone controlled magic. 
Perhaps you need an MP of 2500.

In this case, the Wizarding World might well invite Muggle 
students with an MQ of 111 or higher to join Hogwarts (same 
as that of Wizarding students) because there is a realistic 
chance (and if their MQ is high enough, perhaps a near 
certainty) that by adulthood, they will start spontaneously 
doing magic, and they need to be trained. But there's no 
real need to invite those Muggleborns with a lower MQ to 
join because they are highly unlikely to ever develop magic 
(though a Muggle with an MQ of 50 - well below that of the 
Wizarding World - might still find themselves in trouble if 
they somehow got hold of a magical tea set... muggle-
baiting!).

And in certain rare cases, where a Muggle does have contact 
with magic and magic devices...

>From what I've read, JKR has said someone in one of the 
books will show signs of magical ability later in life than 
normal.

Perhaps Aunt Petunia has an MQ of 50 (so an adult MP of 
1100) - and exposed to Harry's magical items, she suddenly 
becomes able to use a wand to do something...

Speculation, of course.

All of this is speculation, and the numbers are arbitrary - 
but I think better when I use numbers. So I do so.

Other possible ideas...

Perhaps with half-giants, things work differently. Perhaps a 
giant only matures magically till the age of 10, and a half 
giant to the age of 15 (instead of the 22, I've been using 
for humans).

If Hagrid had an MQ of 115, then he'd qualify for Hogwarts 
at age 11 - but his adult MP would never be higher than 1725 
- not at the 2400 level of a human Hogwarts graduate as an 
adult.

Or Lupin... maybe being bitten by a werewolf gives a child 
an 'MQ' boost (after all it's a magical creature.

Maybe Lupin's natural MQ was only 100 and being bitten upped 
it to 115 - meaning he qualified for Hogwarts, but in 
addition to the fact that he was regarded as dangerous, some 
might have felt he still really wasn't qualified...

Just throwing some ideas around here in case anyone wants to 
disect all this.



Yours Without Wax, Dreadnought
Shaun Hately | www.alphalink.com.au/~drednort/thelab.html
(ISTJ)       | drednort at alphalink.com.au | ICQ: 6898200 
"You know the very powerful and the very stupid have one
thing in common. They don't alter their views to fit the 
facts. They alter the facts to fit the views. Which can be 
uncomfortable if you happen to be one of the facts that 
need altering." The Doctor - Doctor Who: The Face of Evil
Where am I: Frankston, Victoria, Australia


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