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After that fateful Triwizard Tournament, each school settled back into their own. Unknowingly, students across all three schools made almost the exact same jokes about the obvious superiority of their own alma mater. Beauxbatons giggled about drafty castles and draftier boats. Students at Durmstrang wondered loudly at the lack of Dark Arts at both schools: did teachers expect the rest of the world to just say ‘oh, you never learned dueling? Well alright then I suppose we’ll just have to shake hands.’ Although, knowing Hogwarts, they probably did expect that. And of course Hogwarts rolled their eyes at the silliness of Beauxbatons and frowned at the harshness of Durmstrang.
Upon returning home, every student gave themselves a smug little pat on the back for being lucky enough to go to their school.
But despite themselves, each school found itself a little changed.
The next year, Beauxbatons had statues standing sentry in their halls. Not suits of armor of course, how gauche. The statues at Beauxbaton were dressed in only the most lavish of gowns. But still, Madame Olympe admitted grudgingly, that kind of defense hadn’t occurred to her forebearers. And, while the statues might have been richly dressed, they hid enough strength to withstand even the cruelest of curses. Beauty and strength need not be mutually exclusive, after all, as any Beauxbatons student knows.
Eventually the statues simply became part of the landscape of Beauxbatons, adding flourish to the classrooms and dignity to their Great Hall. Eventually, students forgot that they hadn’t always been there - that they had been ideas taken from other schools and other countries. Just as Hogwarts students remain oblivious to how Godric Gryffindor got the idea for moving staircases when he visited Adalard Papillonlisse (whose daughter would go on to found Beauxbatons). Just as Durmstrang has forgotten how Harfang Munter learned several of his more martial forms of magic from students of Mahoutokoro.
Whether or not people want to admit it, whether or not they even know, no man is an island. You cannot be in this world without being a part of it, without being affected by all the other parts of this world. That’s especially true for schools.
(even Oahu’s Māmaku Kaiao Kehan, which is on an island)