Welcome to Hickstead, home to both Seven Oak Stables, and Blue Acre - two rival stables. Both offer opportunities for their clients to reach the highest level of excellence. Each stable differs from the other, so choose wisely and never forget, loyalty is everything... Meanwhile as the stables battle it out, there's trouble brewing at the university. Be careful, if you don't pick a side you may get caught in the cross-fire...
This is an chilled out rpg with a super friendly and relaxed atmosphere! Remember to sign up with your characters full name in all caps and don't forget to do your claims! Thank you and Welcome, we've been established since 10th March 2009 but unfortunately have had to close guest view of our boards due to multiple sites ripping off our hard work, such a shame! Come chat to us in Discord before joining if you like!.
Tomas glided across to his class with Luka trotting along beside him, the red merle Collie more than ready to get down to business. Using his walking stick, he pulled the door handle down and pushed it inwards, letting himself into the classroom, eyes briefly roving over the students present, loudly hitting his cane on the desk to gain everyone's attention.
"Welcome everyone to your first introductory lesson in Social Science and Criminal Studies. You may call me Sir or Mr Gentry, nothing else."
He set down a blanket on the floor, taking several minutes to get it laying properly and got Luka to lay down before he turned to face the class.
"Yes, he will be here every class, he is here to help me throughout the year when I cannot manage certain elements. His name is Luka. No, you cannot call him to sit with you, you cannot feed him, and you will respect him as if he is a teacher."
Maeve had been happy enough with her course-load, but had decided that she could pick up another. She wasn't taking a class on criminal studies because she wanted to go into law, more because she wanted to learn a little more about the subject. She blamed it on the fact that she had got interested in writing after reading through psychological thrillers, most of which had a strong police presence in them, so she needed to understand the way that worked, if she wanted to follow the likes of Camilla Läckberg.
She jumped as the cane hit the top of a desk, pressing her lips together as she pulled back a little, sitting straighter. She listened as Mr Gentry went through his rules, respecting him a little more for putting down the law in his first class. She'd had too many classes during her schooling career where the teachers were too causal, acting like their students' best friend on the first day, only to come down on them like a tonne of bricks a week later when a student was too informal with them. She smiled as she looked at the dog, nodding as the canine was included into the 'rules', and she pressed her lips together to stop from asking if they should address the dog as Mr Luka, with how the man had been speaking, she didn't think a question like that would be appreciated.
Ivey wasn’t expecting to have another introductory class in her second year, but the Uni she was transferring to would allow an extra social or psych class to transfer over. Being someone who wasn’t a fan of extending another year to herself, Ivey chose Social and Criminal studies. It would be an interesting one for sure, but she would be okay with it. All she had to do was pass.
She walked into the room after her Saltwater lab, smelling like the ocean without being near or close to the beach. Ivey had made sure to scrub herself well, as she knew not everyone loved the smell of seaweed. Hair up in a bun, Ivey got to class in time.
She picked out a seat and sat. The professor looked like Professor with his equally stern-looking face. His introduction was far from the warm ones that she had received from other teachers. But Ivey was good at sitting and listening. She had no reason to cause a ruckus.
She had really hated that her class advisor had suggested that she take a social science. Well, it was required to take one social science just to say that you did it, make you 'well rounded' or something, but Aria Martin wasn't feeling it. Why should she have to sit in a class that wasn't going to benefit her in life? Social Science and Criminal Studies had utterly nothing to do with her major in technology and design. Maybe cyber security, but the young woman still felt like that was a stretch. Unfortunately, there was utterly nothing that she could but go to class. So away she went.
Aria dragged herself in a huff from the dorm and cut across campus the fastest way she could think of in order to get the social science sections. Peering in, the professor hadn't arrived yet. Dark brown eyes took in some familiar faces and not so familiar faces, but most importantly, Lyssa wasn't there, which made her breathe a sigh of relief. Her eyes fell in on an empty desk next two two blonde girls. One she didn't recognize, but the other she did. Ivey Kinsley. Until a few days ago, Aria had known nothing about her other than what she heard Bambi Pelner said, but now she knew a lot about her.
She wouldn't consider Ivey a friend per say, but after crying with her in the library - while over different people and topics, Aria could not help but to feel a slight kinship towards the girl. Heading over, she slid right into the seat next to the blonde, giving a nod to her and the other girl next to her. She apparently did so right in time too, because just then, a man came gliding in and around her - Aria could hear some of the heavy set, deep sighs over his looks. The sounds made her crunch her face, was he cute? Her eyes narrowed as she cocked her head to stare the professor but try as she might - she couldn't see it. There was also something far more distracting in the room.
A dog.
Her gaze fell on it. Some sheep dog of some sorts, but it wasn't the walking rug type. The sound of the cane cracked across the classroom, gathering their attention and Aria could already feel her mood start to sour: "Welcome everyone to your first introductory lesson in Social Science and Criminal Studies. You may call me Sir or Mr Gentry, nothing else. Yes, he will be here every class, he is here to help me throughout the year when I cannot manage certain elements. His name is Luka. No, you cannot call him to sit with you, you cannot feed him, and you will respect him as if he is a teacher." This was utterly stupid. A sigh escaped her, although it wasn't the mooning sigh like the other girls and boys, "Are we suppose to call him Sir or Mr. Luka also?"
i'll sleep when i'm dead ☠︎︎ ☠︎︎ ☠︎︎
thanks aofie!
Nineteen . Student - Technology & Design . Confused (LGBTQ+) . Single Former Minion & Current Social Outcast
"Are we suppose to call him Sir or Mr. Luka also?"
His eyes snapped straight to the speaker, zeroing in on her - old training taking hold as he leaned on his cane a little more.
"Yes," he replied, his tone still very abrupt and final, "Respect him as if he were a teacher. Now, everyone pay attention and keep up - I do not like to repeat myself."
He turned to the white board, bracing the cane as he did and reached up to the board, "I want everyone to turn to the back of their note books or make a section on your laptop - I don't care which - and write down as the heading 'Glossary'. Under that the words - 'Social Science, Definition'. Social Science is defined by, in the broadest sense, the study of society and the manner in which people behave and influence the world around us. Specific to this class, we will be looking more so at people - the sociology, psychology and culture. We will be looking as well into some political science, anthropology and economics at some point as well."
He turned back to look at his students, "Your studies will be a fifty-fifty split, week about, on each subject and everything covered will be interlinked in some way. Next heading - 'Criminal Studies, aka Criminology'. Defined in the terms of studying crime, illegal actions that society punishes through the government legal system. Now in and of it self, Criminology is a broad field with many, many aspects and specialties. We will be diving briefly into everything in some respect, however will mainly be looking at learning and studying criminals who were driven by certain aspects of society - money, power, greed, unfortunate circumstance, trauma and so on. We will be doing an in depth case review that will be worth half your passing grade end of the year, so be prepared."
Maeve's brows rose when one of the students actually went there, and asked about addressing the dog, though the teacher's response almost got an eyeroll. Police dogs, while given the same respects at a funeral, they were the officer's partner, but they were still a dog, an incredibly well trained one.
She opened her folder, removed the paper and flipped it open to the last tab and wrote glossary down the tab, she'd make a fancy header on the page later, flipping that over, she put the paper into the folder and began to write down everything Mr Gentry was saying.
She couldn't hold back the snort though at the mention of trauma being a drive for someone becoming a criminal. She hated that excuse, as it was the biggest cop-out that a lawyer could use: "Oh, so and so only robbed the bank and killed those people (in cold blood, as they had been planning it for the last six months as shown by the surveillance photos and blueprints in their basement), because they were beaten as a child." It was almost as bad as judges who gave sports stars a free-pass from assaulting an underage girl because it would "ruin their sporting career, or chances of getting a scholarship", ignoring the fact that said boy just destroyed the life of a girl.
Ivey couldn’t help but smirk at the comment Aria made. She would have to compliment her on it later, as talking about peers would probably be banned. Even if a breath was done at non-allotted times. Okay, maybe not that serious. She opened her notebook and began writing in that flourished cursive hand.
As the teacher continued, Ivey raised her hand when there was a pause. When she was called, she asked, “Will we only focus on solved cases or will there be some cold cases as well? And will there be fewer known cases, as well?” She did quite enjoy a lot of the true crime stuff. Not as much as some, but she knew there were a lot of cases out there.
Aria watched as the Professor zeroed in on her with his hard gaze now. Her fellow students also watched her, with a mix of awe, fear, and annoyance. If she had a smidgen of fear in her, she would have felt like prey caught by a predator. But the teenager didn't feel that way, and simply returned her own unimpressed gaze to him: "Yes," he replied, his tone still very abrupt and final, "Respect him as if he were a teacher. Now, everyone pay attention and keep up - I do not like to repeat myself." As soon as Professor Gentry looked away from her, Aria simply rolled her brown eyes, "Aye aye, Captain," she muttered under her breath as she fished out her surface pro.
She set it up as he was already yammering away on vocabulary and definitions and how this would make up a huge chunk of their grade due to a case file. The fact that this was all verbal was even more annoying, whatever. Aria supposed that whatever she missed, she'd just get from Ivey after class. Speaking of the blonde, she was asking a question now about the class. There was something else that was nagging at Aria though as she typed away at these stupid definitions, "So is our grade for this semester made up on the case file, the final, and attendance?" Aria followed up with now, not bothering to raise her hand. If that was the case for the syllabus, that didn't exactly leave a lot of wiggle room for a class that was suppose to be 'fun'.
i'll sleep when i'm dead ☠︎︎ ☠︎︎ ☠︎︎
thanks aofie!
Nineteen . Student - Technology & Design . Confused (LGBTQ+) . Single Former Minion & Current Social Outcast
