Trouble@Hogwarts #coursefees #downwithYou-Know-Who #downwithDeathEaters

Knowing that I would be spending at least the next 12 years in prison, I had decided that I was going to make all of my time a benefit and treat any period of incarceration as if I was, instead, at a boarding school. Just one that I couldn't leave on the mid-term holidays. Welcome to Hogwarts.

This isn't the Hogwarts during the time that Harry Potter was a student here though; rather when Snap was the headmaster and Dementors roamed the school. Most of the students are Death Eaters in training, and all students are required to study the Unforgivable curses. It is hard trying to change house, from Slytherine to Hufflepuff, or Gryffindaw.

Other students tell me what it was like before, when things were better and He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named was still dead and unreturned. They talk about how the classes were places most of them wanted to be, and that discovering new and wondrous things was a joy. Nowadays it is hard to try and really learn anything, especially with the changes in regards to funding. Once, studying was free or supported by charitable endowments left by the founding four; Rowena Ravenclaw, Salazar Slytherin, Goderic Gryffindaw, Helga Hufflepuff. Now however, Shape has introduced course fees for all students taking N.E.W.T. (MSc) level studies; meaning that if I ever want to become an Eco-Aurora (PhD), and work in the Department for the Conservation of Endangered Herbology and Magical Creatures, I need to be able raise enough funds to cover the final part of the course modules.

Fortunately, some of the course costs have been covered already through my being successful a gaining a Longford Scholarship, that covers the first 4,000 Galleons(£), along with two other charitable grants of 500 Galleons each. Unfortunately, this leaves me with a shortfall of 5.000 Galleons necessary to complete my course, an MSc in Sustainable Development with the University of London.

Having spent more than the last 23 years in prison (yes that is not a typo, I have spent over 23 years in prison). I want to be able to do something positive with my life. I have spent zero days of my adult life as a free man, having come to prison as a juvenile, and it is highly unlikely that I am going to find some little job somewhere when I get released when there are others looking for the same work without any criminal convictions. For me to have any real chance of gainful employment when I finally get released, I believe that I will have to be as highly educated and trained as possible for me to stand any chance. Therefore it is my goal to undertake a PhD; but first I must complete my MSc.

To this end I have sent this message, via my owl Fenren, to you all with the hope that you might be willing to assist me in building a new life; one crime-free, away from the ideology of the Death Eaters and You-Know-Who. A life in which I can be a pan of making the world a better place for all endangered life on the Earth, both muggle and magical.

I thank you for you kind consideration,

F.Ellis