After last week’s not so hot Girl Meets Jexica episode, GMW returned to interesting form with Girl Meets Permanent Record.

A story: After receiving a bad grade, Riley realizes high school scores count toward her permanent record.

B story: Auggie’s success in meeting the challenges in 2nd grade.

I have two pet peeves with this episode, so let me get them out of the way first.

1. It’s high school folks.  No one puts the textbooks on the desk like that.
2. I don’t think anyone uses the phrase “permanent record” anymore.  Transcript yes.  RIley can’t be that naive to think one test will go on her permanent record.

That said, this episode provided a little bit of role reversal for Maya and Riley.  Miley is the successful Spanish speaker, while Riley struggles in the class.  I still think there is too much mopey, philosophical stuff going on, but I’ll let that slide based on the overarching theme of the episode: life is going to throw you challenges and how you respond to those challenges is important.

Of course, the role reversal applies to everyone.  Smackle is smarter than Farkle in chemistry; Zay bests Lucas at baseball tryouts (Hi, writers, baseball is a spring sport in NYC); Topanga bests Cory in teacher communication.  Part of me wonders if it would have been better to focus solely on the Maya-Riley reversal instead of applying the scenario to everyone.

I’m also troubled by Riley’s woe-is-me attitude. We know moving into HS is a challenge.  Something tells me that Riley’s natural reaction would be to fight to succeed as opposed to arguing with Sra Feinstein-Chang about her name “Roberta” and her desire to not speak in the target language.  This might have made a more compelling story that whether one grade goes on her permanent record.

I also enjoyed seeing Cory be the “student” here, learning how teaching in high school is so much different than teaching in middle school.  Sra. Feinstein-Chang knows of what she speaks – and is undoubtedly, as a character, willing to challenge her students.  But she challenges herself to see the potential in every student.  Those are the best teachers out there!