By Joe Janes

A Message from Professor Tim Smith

Health Class

Adjunct Professor at Hogwart’s School for Witchcraft and Wizardry

My name is Professor Tim Smith. I am part of the adjunct faculty at Hogwart’s School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. I teach Health. Being part-time means, I have to commute. I don’t get to partake in the fancy meals or parties there. I sometimes get invites, but if I’m not getting paid to be there, why be there. Right? Being part-time, I get treated very differently. I went to a holiday feast my first year. To show them I’m a ream player. I got sat at a small folding table with a few other ancient adjuncts way in the back. I have never been sorted. I didn’t go to Hogwart’s. I went to a mystical community college in Las Vegas run by Penn & Teller. They’re wizards. Sorry. I probably shouldn’t have told you that. That’s okay. They have spells that can selectively wipe memories. Remember when Penn had a ponytail? If you don’t, it worked. 

Being part-time means, I have other jobs, because I have to. I also teach hygiene at Father Karras’s Catholic School of Demonic Possession. I also do healthcare workshops for corporations. I’ll go anywhere anyone needs me to teach about practicing good health. As long as they are paying. I shouldn’t say “go anywhere” because there’s a pandemic going on right now. Happy to do an online workshop. 

Which brings me to why I am recording this message. Parents. I am talking to you. I am sure you have all heard from Headmaster Dumbledore saying everything is fine and the school will follow all safety precautions, blah, blah, blah. What do “safety precautions” even mean at Hogwart’s? Dementors in every hallway? What if someone gets COVID-19? Are we going to lockdown the building and clean it? Do you know how many secret chambers and passageways there are. We have one custodian with a nasty cat. It would take longer than a quarantine to scrub everything from top to bottom. Even with magic, which, by the way, only kills about 55% of the germs. Better off using disinfectant wipes on the spires. 

Wizards have human bodies. We can affect it with magic, but we’re still just skin bags filled with blood, bones, and farts. Even if you can change into a cat, you are a human in the form of a cat. I don’t care how much chocolate you have, there is no cure COVID-19. Butter beer does not prevent it, either. All butter beer does is get people drunk on saturated fats. 

Dumbledore says we’ll all have to wear masks. Look, I am not a no-masker. Masks work out in the real world. But if I am in a building filled with witches and wizards, I want to see whose lips are moving in case they are whispering an incantation that will make me vomit snails. Again. 

Social distancing is not going to work. These are kids. Teenagers. Get my drift. You know what they have me teach in the sex education part of my Health Class? Abstinence. Seriously. You know what abstinence gets you? About three unwanted teen pregnancies every academic year. Thank God they let me teach about genders properly. Many students have come out while I have taught there and, to Headmaster Dumbledore’s credit, they are welcomed and nurtured. It wasn’t always that way. It created many a repressed wizard (Snape). I can’t imagine what a horrible person Draco Malfoy would have become if she didn’t embrace her sexuality and become Donna Malfoy. You are a real woman, Donna. We have your back. 

There are many great things about Hogwart’s. They won’t let us unionize, but it’s still better that teaching muggles. Let the muggles reopen their schools. Hogwart’s should not. Now, I get it, Hogwart’s can’t go online because no computers. No electricity. The “fulltime” teachers all live there. Hello. Magic. Students can use astral projection to meet with their teachers. Sure, some students won’t be very good at it. We teachers are good at it. I’d be more than happy to project  myself to a student to teach them. I have made that offer. You know why Dumbledore said no? Money. They don’t want to pay me and the full-time teachers won’t take on the extra work. They shouldn’t have to. It’s all about money. If students don’t come to the school, we have to charge less tuition. Parents, Hogwart’s cares more about withdrawing from your bank account at Gringott’s than about your child’s health. 

The students of Hogwart’s and their instructors should not be meeting in person. Not until there’s a vaccine. I’m just a part-timer. They’re not listening to me. Parents, it’s your child and your money. They’ll listen to you.