I was chatting with my martial arts teacher to reserve a class, and the reply was:

"Your spot is confirmed should you still wish to participate."

...In my understanding, "should" is used to indicate obligation or duty, like in “You should study hard”.

However, this doesn’t seem to be the case here. It feels more like polite or formal language.

Does "should" have a different usage, as in this example?

Question

I was chatting with my martial arts teacher to reserve a class, and the reply was:

"Your spot is confirmed should you still wish to participate."

...In my understanding, "should" is used to indicate obligation or duty, like in “You should study hard”.

However, this doesn’t seem to be the case here. It feels more like polite or formal language.

Does "should" have a different usage, as in this example?

Answer

Hi Sarah! Great question- in this case, "should" means "in case..."

The same sentence can be read as "Your spot is still confirmed *in case* you still wish to participate."

I hope this helps!