Blackstone Hills Preparatory School/Basic Information
From Unofficial Handbook of the Virtue Universe
Contents |
Mission Statement
Blackstone Hills Preparatory School is a private school sharing many traits with a traditional military academy. However, whereas students from a military academy are being groomed with the best possible education and the expectation they would graduate to civic service within the military, students from Blackstone Prep instead look to a different civil service: That of the Hero. While not every student from Blackstone will go on to fight for justice in spandex and a cape, it is the hope of the school that each student will grow into an adult with an understanding and a desire to use their powers for the betterment of society as a whole.
Blackstone Hills prides itself on offering exceptional education to its students with a fairly strict grade requirement to participate in squad activities or extra-curricular events like sports. As they say in the pamphlets and brochures; be it stopping an Apocalypse Device or a graduate degree, Blackstone prepares its students for everything.
OOC Information
Blackstone Hills is a low-to-medium powered Super Hero group based on the idea of a superhero academy. The characters are students who attend this school with the awareness of the hero service requirement for graduation. They are assigned into different squads after their first semester and these different squads take on different events and compete for intra-school events. They also have a traditional school experience of classes, malls, dating, homework and the other things one expects from a teen setting.
The goal of Blackstone Hills is to prepare their students for the day where they have to "step up". As such a lot of our focus is on team work both on and off the field, personal growth as characters, and growing comfortable in using your powers in many applications. Because of the service requirement there is the expectation that each student will patrol or help to patrol in their own ways - be it as dispatch and coordination or out on the field helping investigating or even arresting Freakshow.
While it's students aren't the ones saving the world they have been known to save the day in a smaller way. Our general rule of thumb is "Teen Titans" level problems; under level 25-30 content in City of Heroes. While these forces may not ask for particular students by name we generally presume the reputation of the school is such to where these things are roughly around the level of what students might be asked to do (Helping Penelope Yin find her father, discovering the truth about Faultline, the Positron Task Force etc). We aren't the characters asked to save the world; however, we might be the people out sourced by the PPD to help save the district. The Blackstone Uniform carries with it the understanding that, while perhaps not a hero yet, you are one in training and the citizen and civic-servants around can at least depend on you.
Ranks and Squadrons
Blackstone Hills Preparatory School organizes itself by dividing students into one of four squadrons for the duration of their time at the school. These squadrons are multi-grade units which dictate a few facets of student life such as which part of the dormatory students will be housed in, what groupings they can expect for some patrols and team exercises, and teams for many intra-school competitions.
There are five squadrons; The Garnet Squadron which has the color red, The Diamond Squadron which has the color white, The Obsidian Squadron which has the color black, and the Topaz Squadron which has the color sky blue. These are the four official squadrons for students. The fifth group, unofficially known as the The Jade Squadron, is considered a temporary squad to people who are new to Blackstone Hills and has the color green.
Due to the names the prefects from each group are known collectively and colloquially as The Crystal Council. Prefects petition the school to form a squadron at the beginning of the year with two caveats - unless express permission has been given by the last prefect the squadron must have its own original name. While there have been a few other squadrons that have risen and fallen over the years at Blackstone Hills, the history and traditions of each of the original five have made them lasting fixtures within the school.
Student Life
Life at Blackstone Hills is, on the whole, very similar to your average teenager's life: There are classes, tests, dances, school sporting and community events, romances, patrols and the ever dreaded homework and pop quiz. Blackstone Hills participates in a number of intra-mural sports and steadily is producing sporting programs to compete with other local schools. The school prides itself on raising the total student and takes its academics seriously.
Students have both a dress and a casual uniform which they are typically required to wear around campus and for public events. While certainly variations of these have happened (and many students delight in trying to see how much they can get away with changing) on the whole the outfit is worn as issued every day Monday through Thursday. Friday through Sunday are "civilian days" wherein students can dress however they wish so long as they are not on a squadron sponsored patrol.
To further the image of the school (and lend an air of respect to fourteen year olds who are out trying to fight crime) students are also issued a school patrol uniform. More variations are allowed to this - after all teenagers do enjoy their own individuality - but the general theme needs to be clear as arrangements have been made with various organizations around Paragon City to recognize said uniform as that of a student hero.
Rank and File
The first rank anyone gets in Blackstone Hills is that of RECRUIT which serves here to mean probationary member. The responsibilities of recruits is quite low; be a participatory member in your community, your story, and the story of other people. All recruits start out in the Jade Squadron regardless of character age and grade when they first come to BHPS. Typically this period is so that we can get an idea of your character, you as a player, and figure which squadron would be best for a more permanent fit. This period will typically last no more than one month. In character, recruits have the right to patrol in uniform as a hero-in-training with at least one other member. They may join any pre-existing club they wish. They may participate in any school event they wish.
The next rank from recruit is CADET at which point you are a full member. Members are expected to log in frequently to RP and be active within the super group. They are also expected to have at least some monthly contact OOCly with their squad prefect who will also serve as their advocate contact within the group. In character, cadets have the right to patrol in uniform as a hero-in-training by themselves and all of the rights of recruits. In addition they may found new clubs and organizations so long as they have at least two other members and a prefect in charge. They may also create new school events with the approval of a prefect and take campus space.
Above cadet is the rank CADET SERGEANT serving as what would typically be officers. At this rank it is expected, along with your previous other requirements, that you will be attempting to run personal stories and helping run big stories for the group as a whole. Cadet sergeants are also expected (though any rank may) run missions and team experiences for the squadron they are in. In many ways this is the "plot" level of leadership as its primary function.
Finally, the highest rank is PREFECT which are the titles we're giving to our leader corps. Along with all previous other responsibilities, prefects are responsible for maintaining contact with their assigned squadron to make sure that OOC and IC they have a connection to the group. They facilitate story both in the personal sense by presenting Story Opportunities to their players as well as help write and run plot. They run NPCs during meetings at request of players, handle complaints and mediation, cheerlead for stories, and otherwise help support the group. In character, prefects have the privileges of all of the ranks below along with the right to hand out infractions and recommend courses of actions. They may restrict privileges from cadets and recruits such as patrol rights and civilian weekends. They may sign students up for work detail which may range from mowing the lawn to help clean the kitchen. They may approve new clubs, events and organizations.