Schooled (novel)

Schooled

Author	Gordon Korman
Cover artist	Ellice M. Lee
Country	USA
Language	English
Genre	Young Adult Fiction
Publisher	Scholastic
Publication date	2007
Media type	Print
Pages	237
ISBN	978-1-4231-0516-9

Schooled is a 2007 children's book written by Gordon Korman. It is about a hippie named Cap who comes to public school while his grandmother Rain is in the hospital, and makes an impact on the school. It was the Intermediate Winner of the 2010 Young Reader's Choice Awards.

Plot

Capricorn "Capracorn" Anderson lived on Garland Farms, a hippie commune that has seen better days, with his hippie grandmother and teacher Rain all his life. Garland Farms had fourteen families at its peak, but it has slowly decreased to just Rain and Cap. One day, Rain falls out of a plum tree during a lesson and breaks her hip, putting her in the hospital. Cap is put into public school under the care of Floridian "Flora" Donnelly, who was a former member of Garland Farms, and her beautiful daughter Sophie, who is not pleased of Cap's arrival while Rain is recovering. He does not fit in at Claverage Middle School (dubbed C Average by the students), because he is a vegetarian Buddhist, listens to 60's music, wears tie-dyed clothing, has long, unkempt hair, and practices T'ai chi on the lawn.

Cap is only able to make one friend, Hugh Winkleman, the former biggest nerd in school. Cap's arrival is great news for Zach Powers, the 'big man' on campus. His plan is to follow the C Average tradition and elect the biggest nerd/'loser' (now Cap) as the eighth grade president. When Cap becomes president, he is more puzzled than ever, as he has no idea how to work with money, and Zach and his friends often pull pranks on him, such as directing him to non-existent rooms and saying that it was part of the president's duty to know the names of every student at the school. Zach encourages all of his friends and fellow students to make life difficult for Cap, doing anything they can to upset, make fun of, or confuse him. The same is going on at home, where Sophie, much to the distress of her mother, constantly yells at Cap. However, Cap doesn't react much to this abuse, due to his hippie mindset. As Cap begins to understand the outside world and continues to become more popular at the school, the joke starts to turn on Zach.

After Cap saves a bus-driver and many fellow students when the driver suffered a heart attack, the students began to respect him and admire him. Through a series of coincidences and with a little bit of good luck and hippie wisdom, Cap plans a Halloween dance, connects with the students and helps them with their problems, teaches the students how to tie-dye, and involves the entire school in his hobbies, such as T'ai Chi and playing 60's music. This attracts the attention of one of Zach's close friends, Naomi, who, despite helping Zach haze him, is intrigued by his relaxed, kind, and brave behavior, leading her to eventually kiss him. During all this, Cap is becoming more popular, making Hugh extremely jealous. Also sick of Cap's popularity, Zach convinces Hugh to help them take down Cap. On the day of C Average's football game, Hugh dresses Cap up in the jersey of C Average's rival. The entire football team (which includes Zach and one of his friends, Darryl) tackles Cap enthusiastically. This causes Cap to be knocked unconscious, and the entire school goes against the football team for injuring Cap. Later, Darryl feels guilty about the tackle when he later realizes it was Cap. Lena, another one of Zach's friends, tells Darryl that it was Hugh who apparently caused it, and Darryl remembers the day prior, where he saw Hugh and Zach talking in the cafeteria. Enraged, Darryl finds Zach, and yells at him. Zach tells him that it was all Hugh's/his own fault, but Darryl does not believe this and punches Zach. However, Darrell was unaware that Cap was right beside him. Cap sees the violence and tries to stop it by jumping in the way. With Cap yelling "Stop the violence!", Darryl accidentally punches Cap. Zach tells Darrell that it was Darrell's fault Cap was injured twice, making him guiltier. In the end, Cap was admitted to an ambulance due to his injury, and Darryl shouts that he's sorry.

In the ambulance, Cap discovers that Rain has fully healed, and that they're going back home to Garland. However, since his time at the Donneys ' and "C Average", Cap finds it hard to adjust to his now different life. When Cap tells Rain about this, she tells him that he shouldn't worry about them any more, and that his life has always been here at Garland. Back at C Average, the vice principal finds that the entire school dance funds he gave to Cap to pay for the dance have all been donated to charity. With no other choice, the vice principal has to cancel the dance, much to the dismay of the students. Back at Garland, Cap sneaks out to attend the Halloween Dance while Rain is out. He finds Sophie, who then kisses him because of a bracelet he gave her that she believed came from her 'flaky' dad as a birthday gift. They drive to C Average, where Sophie gives him a Mickey Mouse mask to be in costume. However, when they enter, they find that all the kids are dressed up as Cap, having candles and playing 60's music on his guitar. This was caused by a rumor started by the students that Cap died the day Darrell punched him, so Zach and Hugh started a "funeral for Cap" the day of the Halloween dance, (although they really only did it in order to make it seem as if they were friends with Cap in order to restore their, now shattered, popularity) and told all the kids not to tell any teachers. During a "remembrance for Cap," where all the kids say what Cap did that changed their life, Cap takes off his mask, and reveals his true self to the delight of the students (except for Zach and Hugh). As Cap believed this to be his final farewell, he addressed an individual goodbye to every single student in the school, calling them by name as he took what Zach said in the beginning of the year to heart. Rain then arrives at C Average, and Cap explains that even though he knows that he shouldn't have disobeyed her, he wanted to come back and say goodbye to everyone. Cap then says goodbye to every student in the school, naming them correctly. After saying goodbye, Cap and Rain leave, encountering an angry Flora, who is scolding Rain for Cap's misbehavior with the checks. Rain however, pushes this aside, saying it was for a good cause. They exchange a rather cold farewell, and leave.

The next day, Cap is arrested for driving underage, and when he tells the police that it belongs to Garland, the police says that Garland was sold, and takes him to the police station. Rain shows up in a new Mercedes Benz and explains she has decided to change completely, and get with the times, and tells him she has sold Garland's land for $17 million and purchased a condo, and that Cap can return to C Average Middle School, where his new life truly is. Gordon Korman's message is that anyone can fit in no matter the person, so if this hippie can so can you.

See also

• Stargirl, a similar novel by Jerry Spinelli