Spy School

Adult characters in Spy School are largely useless or absent. This motif of useless or incompetent adult characters creates space for teens and pre-teens to think for themselves, take risks, and solve problems. In this novel, adults are not only unhelpful in solving the problem—they’ve created the problem and lack the intelligence or awareness to affect a solution.

Alexander Hale and the principal are two of the primary incompetent adults in the narrative. The principal is depicted as so incompetent that he cannot remember his own key code or password. This aligns with the principal’s confusion when he tries to punish Ben by sending him to the Box, having forgotten that Ben was already sleeping in the Box. Erica tells Ben, “Every time the CIA sent him out into the field, he got captured. He wasn’t a very good spy” (74). Early in the book, Alexander tries to seem helpful. He presents himself as a supportive and highly skilled spy, but he is self-serving and a fraud. Unlike his daughter, Alexander’s “recruitment” of Ben into a mole hunt is not intended to catch the mole, but rather to extract information from Ben that Alexander can take credit for.