A US Professor Hid A Cash Prize On Campus To See If His Students Were Reading The Syllabus

Most people are guilty of skimming through syllabuses, but students of this particular professor are probably beating themselves up over not paying attention to theirs, given the sweet prize they missed out on.

A professor at the University of Tennessee, Kenyon Wilson, decided to test out how many students actually read the syllabus by leaving a hint for a cash prize to whoever paid attention from his music seminar class of over 70 students.

The hint in the syllabus said, "Thus (free to the first who claims; locker one hundred forty-seven; combination fifteen, twenty-five, thirty-five), students may be ineligible to make up classes and […]"

The $50 cash prize was hidden in a locker with a combination, along with a note that read, "Congrats! Please leave your name and date, so I know who found it."

Wilson left the prize in the locker for the entire semester and only went back to see if someone had claimed it after the final exams were done.

When he finally went back and checked the locker, he found the note and cash untouched, proving that nobody read the syllabus thoroughly enough.

"I had great hopes, and I'd be just as happy having this conversation if one of my students found it on the first week," Wilson told CNN.

In a Facebook post, Wilson shared that his "semester-long experiment has come to an end" and shared that he "retrieved the unclaimed treasure."

One of Wilson's students, Haley Decker, shared with CNN how she found the experiment hilarious.

"I think this was a really smart experiment for Dr. Wilson to test out. It definitely made the music students realize that despite repetitive information you should still read through your syllabus carefully," said Decker.