Sabin City has a total of twenty-two secondary schools, which are high schools. There are no middle schools here, only primary schools, secondary schools, and universities.
Students at the primary school level need to spend nine years in school before advancing to secondary school for three years. Once they've completed twelve years of education, they can then enter university.
However, not everyone is capable of getting into university. The current university admission rate is less than seventeen percent, mainly due to two reasons.
On one hand, university fees are still too high for ordinary families. They are not like primary and secondary schools, where costs are relatively low. Not all families can afford the four-year university fees.
On the other hand, the current nature of education is essentially a joke. According to some consulting agencies, around ninety percent of university students come from private schools rather than public schools.
The failure of public education, including family financial problems, ultimately limits people's opportunities to attend university. Lynch is one such individual who can't go to university, despite diligently filling out application forms.
In other words, wanting to attend university means that being academically good isn't important. What's important is having a family that can afford high costs, or a family with some power.
The reasons for the election victory of the current Bail Federal President primarily come from two aspects. The first is his promise to complete healthcare reform during his term, reducing medical costs so that everyone can afford to see a doctor.
Secondly, he promised to carry out a new round of educational reform during his term, increasing the proportion of students from public secondary schools entering university from about ten percent to as much as twenty percent. Therefore, people chose him.
As for whether he can accomplish this...maybe we'll know after his term ends. There will always be some people who bear the naive belief that things will turn for the better at the last second when facing this world.
Of course, there isn't absolute despair for the current education system either. Every school has scholarships. Compared to the brutal competition of public schools, scholarships in private schools are easily resolved. The school board can determine who to give them to, which is why people sometimes say that power is greater than or equal to wealth.
Michael's son, young Mike, is such a "good kid" who receives a scholarship every year. Academic performance is only part of a student's evaluation. Life, extracurricular, and after-school activities are also standards for assessing a student. At least he meets the scholarship criteria in these three areas.
Additionally, his family background means young Mike has quite a few good friends at school.
Within a midday timeframe, young Mike borrowed three thousand dollars from friends. This amount is far from enough; he still needs at least two thousand dollars more. But the available money at school has largely been lent to him.
Those who wouldn't lend him money, no matter how much he said, might not be willing to lend to him.
After eating lunch like chewing wax, he ignored his girlfriend's plea and drove back home.
At this time, Mrs. Michael hadn't returned from the hospital. To prevent the criminal from coming back to harm Mrs. Michael again, Mrs. Michael remained in the hospital, receiving police protection.
Many criminals have an inexplicable tendency for silencing, which is what the chief fears, so the entire room was completely empty.
Returning home, young Mike began rummaging through drawers and cabinets in search of cash. Mrs. Michael is a full-time homemaker, which means she often keeps a lot of small change at home for emergencies.
Soon, young Mike found a few hundred dollars in small change, but this was still not enough. It wasn't enough to cover the bartender's fee. He hesitated for a moment, then opened the door to Michael's study.
While Michael is at home, he doesn't allow young Mike to enter the study without permission. Sometimes there are documents casually left there, or some evidence brought back for research.
These things, if damaged, could greatly hinder case investigation and would also saddle Michael with a bad reputation. But now, these are no longer enough to stop young Mike from venting for his mother while proving his own impulse.
He stood at the door in a daze for a moment, then tip-toed into the room. Evidently, he knew Michael was not home, yet he was still so cautious.
He first turned aimlessly and then focused on the desk, recalling that he had seen Michael sometimes put loose change in the drawer. Not everyone likes to carry too many coins because they can distort clothes and be uncomfortable.
He opened the drawers one by one, found the money he wanted, but he wasn't satisfied yet. He wanted to keep looking at what was in these drawers until he opened the second-to-last drawer, finding a gold ring under an obviously bulging file.
He held the ring in his hand, initially intending to put it back, thinking it might belong to Michael or Mrs. Michael. As he was about to put the ring back, he saw a line of words inside the ring.
Curiosity prompted him to pick up the ring again and read it in the light. "My beloved Catherine."
Young Mike was stunned, his expression stiffened momentarily. Clearly, Mrs. Michael's name didn't contain the name Catherine, and it's unlikely anyone would call Michael "Catherine," so without a doubt, the ring belongs to someone else, or is at least meant for someone else.
The harm Mrs. Michael suffered last night, combined with his relentless effort to seek out the truth, were all shattered in front of this ring full of obvious betrayal marks.
A surge of anger rose from young Mike's heart. They were being threatened, yet Michael, the head of the household, betrayed the family!
The idea of wanting to put the ring back disappeared as well. He gripped the ring in his hand with a cold face, decided to use his hardly mature, yet pretend to be mature brain to set a plan.
He wanted to destroy this ring that could potentially ruin the harmony of his family. He acted maturely, attempting to give Michael, his father, a chance to save the family, just like in many TV shows.
At this moment, he felt he had grown up, matured, not so childish anymore, so naturally, he wanted to destroy this evidence.
If he sold this ring, he could almost collect enough money.
A little later, young Mike appeared outside a pawn shop. He had learned from his father's conversations with colleagues that some pawn shops frequently dealt with stolen goods.
They never asked about the origins of items, marking them ancient artefacts and buying them, then issuing receipts.
Young Mike, on the other side of the city, found a pawn shop. He ran such a long way, not wanting the pawn shop owner to recognize him, which was also his inexplicable self-perceived maturity.
"A gold ring…" The pawn shop owner seemed to be in his fifties, somewhat balding, wearing a brown short-sleeve shirt.
He wore glasses, looked down at the gold ring that kept spinning in his hand, and the inscription inside the ring, then he looked up at young Mike, "How much do you plan to sell it for?"
Young Mike was a bit nervous; this was his first time doing such a thing. He didn't want people to see his childishness. He just wanted to be mature as much as possible. He pretended to be calm and said, "At least five hundred dollars!" Adding, he supplemented a basis for his price, "It's pure gold!"
The pawn shop owner curled his lip, "Just because you say it's pure gold doesn't mean it really is. I need to burn it with fire; wait a minute!" Saying this, regardless of young Mike's agreement, he turned around and walked into the room behind with the ring.
If an experienced person were here, they would spot a problem: no one lets a ring out of their sight, except those who are immature but pretend to be mature.
The pawn shop owner walked into the back room and quietly picked up the phone, dialing a private number.
"Someone came to sell a ring… Right, the one you mentioned last time, I got it. I'll stall him!"
The pawn shop calmly hung up the phone. Everyone knows that pawn shops resell stolen goods; they can do it openly without police or investigation bureau interference because of their "cooperation."
They are also one of the police, or bureau investigators' informants!
If young Mike could have heard his father's complete conversation with colleagues that day, he would have known that the focus of Michael and his colleagues' discussion wasn't about pawn shops dealing with stolen goods, but rather obtaining clues from them.