A/N – I do not own Harry Potter
Chapter 2 – The Staff Meeting
One week later, once Albus Dumbledore had worked out the details of the new class schedules, he made an announcement during breakfast that there would be a staff meeting later that evening after dinner in the teacher's lounge. Of course, there were two teachers who were rarely at meals, and to them he delivered the message in person.
Severus Snape was busy brewing a potion, just as Albus expected, and was not pleased that he would be torn away from it for something as unimportant as a staff meeting. Only the mollification that Gryffindors and Slytherins would no longer have classes together stopped him from refusing to go altogether.
Trelawney was staring into a cup of tea leaves, making mostly obvious or false predictions about the coming year. "Headmaster Dumbledore! I have seen great things coming in Hogwart's future," she exclaimed with a flourish of her pink shawl.
Albus smiled gently and nodded, "Indeed there are, Professor Trelawney, indeed there are. As I am sure you have also foreseen, there will be a staff meeting after dinner in the teacher's lounge to ensure all the teachers are aware of the changes, if you would be so kind to join us?"
"The stars have foretold that I will attend tonight, and so I have made no other plans," she confirmed.
"Excellent, thank you. I will see you then," the headmaster said before leaving the divination teacher to gaze into the beyond.
"Perhaps some of you have felt the castle's magic changing dramatically earlier today," Professor Dumbledore opened, looking around the assembled teachers and noting the few nodding heads.
"Hogwarts will be very different this term than what any of us are used to, and I assure you that I am just as new to this concept as any of you," he assured them, twinkling eyes on full display.
Muttering broke out amongst the
teachers, speculating on what exactly this new concept was, until a
few minutes later Severus snapped,
"Are you going to tell us,
headmaster, or are you going to make us guess all night?"
"As of this morning, the Sorting Hat
has decided to abolish the house system..."
For two hours
Dumbledore answered every question his staff had, thankful that he
had spent as much time preparing for this meeting as he had.
Minerva in particular had been very picky on the details on how, exactly, this would affect classes.
Flitwick was concerned about how the upper years would react to the change, and how much house loyalties would affect the new pairs and groups.
In the end, the teachers, except for Snape (who declined to give his opinion), and Trelawney (who claimed to have known about it all along), verbally agreed that while this was certainly a needed change that they believed would be helpful, that it would take a lot of work.
To close the meeting, Dumbledore gave a reminder to all the teachers,
"Remember, Harry Potter will be starting this year."