Our oldest got good news today and congratulations are in order, even though the news may not relieve her stress. Or ours.

Our oldest received notice that she’d passed the entrance exam and been accepted to the private school that serves as her second choice/back up school. This means that whatever happens she’ll be able to go to a good school.

Unfortunately for both us and the school, they sent the list of “sign up” fees and both She Who Must Be Obeyed and I had small heart attacks. This means we’ve ordered our oldest to redouble her efforts to get into her first choice school. If she doesn’t I’ve promised to seize her tablet and all electronics until she graduates from high school.

Note: That is actually a half-truth: If she doesn’t get into the cheaper school, we’ll have to sell the electronics to help fund her going there.

Note to the school: Thanks for your honesty, but I’m not sure honesty’s the best policy for getting students.

As I’ve mentioned before, the next exam is at the beginning of March which means she has another five weeks (exactly) to study for the exam. We’ve also started sending her to juku (or cram school) once a week to get extra tutoring in mathematics. (She’s not to the level of maths where they stop using numbers, but she’s way beyond the level where I can help her other than to cheer her on/tell her to put her damned tablet away.)

Until she gets the results from the next exam, we will pay a small fee to hold her place on the private school’s roster until we make a final decision, sell items, etc.

Luckily, she likes her first choice a lot, so she’s got a lot of incentive to study. On the other hand, now that she’s got a sure thing, we may have to keep after her.