He stared at the broken pencil tip with the intensity of someone who saw the final hope for salvation suddenly snuffed out. The graphite tip of his last number 2 pencil was laying next to the thirty-fifth row of bubbles. It was a final chance to prove himself for his teacher, one of the few women in his life that he completely respected and wanted to perform well for. Unfortunately, he had been so eager, so overzealous, that he had pressed too hard; he had doomed her. His failure would be the axe that brought her down. The tears began to flow freely, making moist spots on the rows for the other sixty-five capsules waiting to be filled with knowledge on the paper. It was too late though; in this high stakes society he had already fallen behind, there was not enough time left to make up for the mistake.
He heard sometimes, from his great grandparents, that occasionally learning had been fun when they were kids. They talked of colors and crayons, glue and felt, wooden blocks and something called recess. As they talked about this fantasy, fairytale version of school, he could not seem to put it together in any way that made sense to him. It was so different; it was so…varied and chaotic that he did not understand how anything was ever accomplished with students always talking and working together. How could people possibly, ever, get anything done when they were allowed to work on projects? How did they show understanding without answering questions with only one answer? He couldn’t comprehend it.
What he did comprehend was the fact that his teacher would be executed for his failure on the test. His great grandparents had said that when they had supported the accountability movement they had not realized that eventually teachers would be punished with execution based on the scores of their students. At one point they had talked about making teaching competitive and rewarding teachers for helping their students perform better than their peers, but over time they realized that with the push for ever increasing standards, the only way to truly get teachers to bring every student forward by leaps and bounds was to make examples of those teachers whose students with subpar performance. After the first round of executions, they found that both teachers and students were motivated to a much higher degree.
Eventually it became standard procedure to take the top ten percent of graduating classes in college and force them into the teaching profession. The bottom ten percent of the teachers in the school system at the end of the previous testing term were removed from the classroom and executed in front of the school through evisceration, racking, and eventual beheading on the first day of the new term. This provided both a reminder to the students and the staff about the importance of reliable data and the necessity of ever increasing productivity. In addition, the removal of the bottom ten percent made space in the ranks for the best and brightest coming in the door. By mandating the top ten percent of graduating classes to go into education and placing them in the areas of highest need, society and the students were best served.
He self-consciously raised his hand and waited for the cameras in the ceiling to pick up the movement. Then, he placed his hands on the top of the desk with his palms down and waited for the designated male officer to enter the room. It had to be a male; the number of students caught with notes or microchips in their clothes had made it necessary for all students to take their tests stripped to their skins. That way, cheating would be stamped out completely. Each room was monitored and taped using the best audio and video recording equipment available so that it could be analyzed at a later date by teams specifically trained in the most subversive cheating techniques. He remained completely still to make sure that there was no reason for them to suspect him of anything suspicious.
The door slid open silently and the security guard came in with his taser raised and pointed toward Blake’s back as he sat with his palms flat and his head lowered, eyes on the broken tip. The guard came around the front of the desk and looked at Blake as if he were a caged, feral animal. Blake waited until the guard motioned before looking up toward the man. The guard wore a tag that identified him as 545661 though Blake was sure that he had a name, even if society did not remember it now. The guard put a finger to his lips and motioned Blake to stand and place his hands on the pat down circles painted on the wall. Then, a group of test monitors in sterilized quarantine garb entered the room and examined the test that Blake had been working on. He heard the sharp intake of breath as the monitors saw the fine dusting of graphite dust that coated the answer bubbles for questions thirty-five to forty. They observed the broken tip of the pencil and removed it from the desk with tweezers. The tip was carefully put into a test tube and sealed with Blake’s identifier scribed across the seal.
Then he heard the gasp and the mutter as their eyes feel across the wet smears on the page. He could feel their heads turn in his direction and the weight of their stares crushed him. It was like an avalanche and finally his reserves broke. The tears began to leak out more quickly and he felt his chest begin to heave. The guard’s eyes went wide as he saw the sudden movements of Blake’s shoulders and heard the beginnings of a sob in Blake’s throat. He threw his arms around Blake and threw him out of the door before the sound was able to distract the other students in the room.
Blake tried to look back as he was shoved from the room. The guard’s eyes met Blake’s before he calmly raised his taser and fired. Blake’s last thought before the pain racked his body was how sorry he was for falling behind. The world went black.
None of the other students even paused in their test taking.
