Chapter 62: Leading the Team
Faced with the whole class’s collection of mistake notebooks, Gu Qinghuan was dumbfounded, “Huh? What’s going on here?”
Xu Xinghe coughed twice, “Well, um… someone asked me about it, and then… it spread…”
Say what you will, Class 3 students really loved joining in on things. Any activity, they wanted a part in it.
Especially under Gu Qinghuan’s leadership as class president — she was always posting in the class group chat, whether it was organizing flowers for Teacher’s Day or that time the student council arranged the “catching the cat” mission.
After so many times, everyone had gotten used to it: if something came up, they’d join if they could. After all, their class president wouldn’t let them lose out.
Gu Qinghuan scratched her head and caught sight of Qin Yue laughing away on the side. An idea popped into her head — she grabbed him, “Vice president~”
Qin Yue froze. When she suddenly called him “Vice president” out of nowhere, it definitely wasn’t good news!
“I noticed you handled the Teacher’s Day tally in the group chat pretty well last time, so I’ll leave this to you too.” Gu Qinghuan piled the stack of mistake notebooks onto Qin Yue’s desk.
“Huh?” Now it was Qin Yue’s turn to be stunned.
“Besides, out of the four of us, you have the most mistakes, and your mistakes overlap the most with everyone else’s,” Gu Qinghuan said righteously. “These are exactly the mistakes you’d want explained anyway!”
“Wait, hold on—” Qin Yue’s brain was working faster than ever. “You’re not planning to have me explain these to everyone later, are you?”
Gu Qinghuan blinked at him, then gave a big thumbs-up.
Qin Yue’s defenses crumbled instantly, “I’m sixth from the bottom!”
“So what? Sixth from the bottom can’t explain questions?” Gu Qinghuan shot back. “I’m tenth from the bottom!”
Jiang Chuchu added from the side, “I’m nineteenth from the bottom.”
Yu Xin hesitated. “I’m… twenty-fourth from the bottom?”
Qin Yue clutched his chest. “I’m tired… let the world end already.”
In the end, the diligent old ox— no, Vice president Qin Yue — still took on the task of compiling the mistakes.
But Gu Qinghuan and the others didn’t escape either. Qin Yue said there was no way they could dump all these mistakes on Su Lin; she didn’t have that much time.
So, after he sorted them out, the questions Gu Qinghuan and the others hadn’t gotten wrong and wouldn’t be asking Su Lin about would be their responsibility to explain.
Yu Xin was about to agree right away, but Jiang Chuchu stopped her, “Wait — once you finish compiling, divide them up. For example, for English and Chinese, Xie Xiangxue and Xu Xinghe are the top scorers in those subjects, so they can help explain too.”
Gu Qinghuan agreed, “Right. For questions we can solve internally, we’ll split the work and handle them ourselves. That way, everyone can get involved, and it reduces the pressure on any one person.”
Qin Yue thought about it — true, not just for Su Lin’s sake, but even he couldn’t handle explaining so many questions alone!
With that thought, he became a lot more enthusiastic. He didn’t even take a lunch break at noon, dragging along the top-ranked or single-subject-high-score students in the class to work on compiling together.
They were all energetic high schoolers, so skipping lunch break wasn’t a big deal. In fact, having so many people discussing together meant they could learn from one another.
Their homeroom teacher, Chen Zelin, had lunch in the cafeteria and wandered to the classroom door at noon, intending to check in on his students.
What he saw was everyone chatting animatedly, split into several small groups, writing on the blackboard, or using the projector to explain exam questions.
Chen Zelin rubbed his forehead and went back to the office. Sitting down, he couldn’t help but mutter, “Did the kids take the wrong medicine?”
“Pfft!” Li Guying, the homeroom teacher of Class 1, who was sitting opposite him, burst into laughter when she heard, “What’s up with your students?”
“They’re doing peer tutoring in the classroom,” Chen Zelin said. “Explaining mistakes to each other — they’re more enthusiastic than in class.”
Li Guying was also a little shocked, “How did you train them to be so self-motivated?”
“I didn’t,” Chen Zelin waved his hands repeatedly. “No idea what’s going on. I’ll have to ask our class president when I get the chance.”
His gut told him this had something to do with Gu Qinghuan — even if it wasn’t her idea, she definitely knew about it. Asking her would be the right move.
“But Class 3’s overall grades are indeed good this time. Their average score is noticeably higher than the grade average,” Li Guying said, then frowned as she thought of her own class. “Out of my 20 students, three or four are just here to coast. I have no idea how to teach them.”
No matter how strong Mingde High’s teaching staff was, students had to be willing to learn. Every year there were always a few who didn’t study at all, and whichever homeroom teacher got them just had to accept it.
Chen Zelin didn’t know how to comfort her, but before he could speak, a loud bang sounded from the other side of the office, startling them both.
They looked up to see Shen Mingzhe, the homeroom teacher of Class 12, slamming his cup onto the desk, his face dark, before storming out aggressively.
That made all the other teachers in the office glance over. But when they saw who it was, they exchanged looks and silently turned away.
Sensing the tense atmosphere, Chen Zelin didn’t say anything aloud. Instead, he messaged Li Guying: [What’s up with Teacher Shen?]
Li Guying replied: [Probably mad? Class 12’s average score was the lowest this time. I heard Director Zhang scolded him.]
Director Zhang — full name Zhang Xuehai — was the school’s academic affairs director. He was strict, a bit old-fashioned, and kept a tight grip on the teachers.
Last Teacher’s Day, it was Zhang Xuehai who had organized the morning meeting for the Year 1 teachers.
Hearing that, Chen Zelin didn’t dare ask further.
This was his first time as a homeroom teacher, whereas Shen Mingzhe had already led several cohorts.
Given that Class 3’s average score was high and Class 12’s was the lowest, it was possible Shen’s anger was directed at him.
As for the teachers’ side of things, the students were naturally unaware.
Although Gu Qinghuan had said she’d leave the compiling work to Qin Yue, she didn’t really wash her hands of it. After finishing her own mistakes, she went to help Qin Yue.
In the end, they worked together to finish compiling everything and got it into Su Lin’s hands before the end of the school day.
Su Lin flipped through it, a little surprised, “You guys got this many questions wrong?”
The sixth-from-the-bottom and twelfth-from-the-bottom students each stared at the ceiling and the floor, anything to avoid looking at the grade’s top student.
Luckily, there was also the grade’s fourth-ranked student present.
Yu Xin explained, “This one’s my mistakes, this one’s Chuchu’s, and this thick one isn’t just Qinghuan’s and Qin Yue’s — it’s also the class’s common mistakes. Everyone wants to see your thought process for solving them.”
Su Lin understood and didn’t mind.
When she said “many” earlier, it was only in comparison to Yu Xin’s and Jiang Chuchu’s. In reality, it wouldn’t take her much effort to go over them.
“Alright, I’ll go over your weak points tonight and start tutoring tomorrow,” Su Lin said.
“Oh, by the way,” Gu Qinghuan asked casually, “Has your mother been discharged yet?”
“She’s still in the hospital for observation, but the doctor says she should be discharged this weekend.” Su Lin’s expression softened slightly when talking about her mother.
She then thanked Yu Xin sincerely, “Thank you again for your donation.”
Yu Xin quickly shook her head, “That money didn’t come from me alone. Being able to use it to help you is the best use for it.”
Su Lin gave a slight nod, “I’ll make sure to repay all of you.”
She silently made up her mind — starting from tomorrow’s tutoring, she would make sure to properly help Yu Xin and the others, and at the very least, never let Gu Qinghuan and Qin Yue make such “low-level” mistakes again.
Gu Qinghuan and Qin Yue: For some reason… it suddenly feels a little chilly.
