juniors

1. 1
   noun

   Plural of junior.

   The firm's juniors handled the routine paperwork while the partners met clients.

   At the dojo, the juniors trained during the early evening session.

   Note

   A regular -s plural that carries every countable sense of junior: younger people, third-year students in the US and the Philippines, pupils of a British junior school, and junior barristers in chambers. The clothing size usually stays singular, since that sense is uncountable. The same spelling is also the present-tense verb, and position tells them apart: the juniors argue, but she juniors on the case.

2. 2
   nounAustraliaUK

   The section of a primary school that teaches older children, typically years (grades) three to six.

   Children leave the infants and join the juniors at around age seven.

   The juniors put on their own assembly each Friday morning.

   Note

   A schooling word from the UK and Australia, nearly always paired with infants, the section that comes before it. Children move from infants to juniors. It appears both with and without the article, as in the juniors or simply juniors. Craig Revel Horwood's All Balls and Glitter (2011) shows how big that step can feel: "it felt like going to big school." Key Stage 2 names roughly the same years in more formal terms.

3. 3
   verb

   Third-person singular simple present of junior.

   Note

   The verb behind this form has two jobs. Most often it means working in a junior role, with or without an object: she juniors on appeals, he juniors a case. Less often it is transitive and belongs to teaching, where it means having advanced students help instruct beginners. Because it is spelled like the plural noun, the sentence shows which is meant: here it follows a singular subject.

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