I've started a contest this semester. Each week, buried in the handouts, is an opportunity to get Contest Points. At the end of the semester, students with Contest Points get dibs on my books and CDs; the student with the most points gets any single item, and then we proceed in point order. If there are more items than students with points, we repeat until all items are gone.

So I sort of assumed that cheating wouldn't be a big problem, because there's no incentive to cheat. Or at least, there's no incentive to cooperate with cheaters. Haha. Silly me.

I got this email this morning:

Sat, 23 Mar 2002 12:36:52 +0800 (CST) From: ... guet@aufrecht.org work for Contest Points

1:All US States that border TN:KY,VA,NC,GA,AL,MS,AR,MO.(http://unitedkingdom.intelepages.com/world map) 2:APT means apartment; 3:there were altogether 2,725 postal workers bitten by dogs. (http://www.infoplease.com)

and a few minutes later, this email:

Sat, 23 Mar 2002 12:43:49 +0800 (CST) From: [...] guet@aufrecht.org Fw: work for Contest Points

week 4 [student name and number]

1:All US States that border TN:KY,VA,NC,GA,AL,MS,AR,MO.(http://unitedkingdom.intelepages.com/world map) 2:APT means apartment; 3:there were altogether 2,725 postal workers bitten by dogs. (http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0110426.HTML.Postal Regulations.)

Un-(obscenity-deleted)-believable. Why would student A share, and why would student do such a pathetic job of hiding the source? So, rather than deal with cheating, and particularly since there were no rules on cheating in the contest announcement, I'm simply going to announce to the whole class that some students are collaborating and that I suggest, if they wish to be competitive, that they also form teams.

This tendency to cheat, brazenly (the second student in the sequence above also cheated, un-apologetically, on his mid-term last semester, and has been skipping my class this semester. I think maybe he hates me.) is so powerful that it must, it simply must be genetic. Culture alone can't explain it.

Anyway, if readers would like to email with contest suggestions, preferably things that require creative thinking (in English) and can't be found on Google, I welcome your suggestions.