Re: [HPforGrownups] ¿Were James Potter & Lily Evans really Head-Boy & Head-Girl?

[Bart Lidofsky]

No: HPFGUIDX 178615

From: Ŭalabio‽ <Walabio at MacOSX.COM>
>	It seems that to be Head-Boy or Head-Girl, one must be firstly a  
>Prefect.  Rubeus Hagrid states that Lily Evens and James Potter were  
>Head-Girl and Head-Boy.  James Potter was never a Prefect.  

Bart:
A little bit on public school economics: public schools generally operated on a tight budget. Therefore, any reduction of expenditure that they could achieve without reducing the quality of the education was taken. The concept of "prefects" were to allow the students to police themselves, thus reducing cost on supervisory personnel. It was justified as a "reward" to the students, and also that it was "character building". 

Head Boy and Head Girl was a somewhat different proposition. The idea of the Head Boy and Head Girl (as opposed to someone who gets into the potions too much, who is the Head Case, or the girl who is a mite too friendly with the boys, who is, well, you get the idea) is to represent the school. As such, criteria can vary greatly from school to school, from the students with the highest grades, to the favorites of the teachers, to voting by the student body itself. There is no indication how this was done and Hogwarts, however.

Bart