Prep

Pick two fake universities and "enroll" half the players in each.  Print Player Cards and Degree Cards-- one set each for every player.  Print score sheet.  Clip all cards.  Write player names on score sheet. 

Set-Up

1- Players are called "students", and just like real students, they should sit upright.  Upright around a table or upright in a circle on the floor.  So arrange your students before you do anything else.  The space they surround is called the "study area".

2- Next, pass out Degree Cards.  Give each student their beginning "college savings" of seven cards (14 points):

1 Doctor Card @ 4 points

1 Master Card @ 3 points

2 Bachelor Cards @ 2 points

3 Associate Cards @ 1 point

3- An Associate Card for each student should be leftover.  Hold one back as a reward for yourself and arrange the rest face up in the middle of the study area.  To make the game fair, the cards should be spread out.

4- Shuffle the Player Cards and deal them.  Each student receives a hand of four cards.

Game Play

Regular Semesters

1- As host, you are "professor" for the first "semester" in the first round.  It is the professor's job to regulate the flow of things by periodically bellowing "all students pass."

2- Begin the game with a hearty professorial bellow, "all students pass."

3- Upon hearing they pass each student selects one of their Player Cards and passes it to the student on their left. 

4- The first semester continues with more bellowing and more passing until someone gains a "shining quatro".  That is, until a student holds all four Player Cards (Freshman, Junior, Sophomore and Senior) in any student's name other than their own.

5- The holder of the shining quatro instantly replaces you as professor.  It becomes their turn to bellow.  So immediately they bellow "graduate", followed by the name of the student they quatroed.  For example, they bellow "graduate Marci".  players (including you and the new professor) then scramble to get one Degree Card from the cards laid out in the study area.

6- Of course, one student will come up short and not get a Degree Card. This student is branded a "flunkout".  As punishment for being so "slow", they must pay the new professor a Degree Card from their college savings.

7- The second semester begins with all students, except the graduate (for example, Marci), "paying tuition" by depositing a Degree Card in the study area.

8- The new professor trades her quatroed Player Cards one for one with the closest four students to her left, and then bellows "all students pass".  Cards are exchanged as before until another shining quatro is obtained, another professor appointed, etc.

9- This is repeated to the point where one student flunks out so much they can no longer afford tuition (their college savings are exhausted).  The bankrupt flunkout is expelled from the game!  Before leaving they trade their hand of Player Cards for the latest shining quatro.  They then take the quatro with them as they wander away to wherever the uneducated wander away to. This departure marks the beginning of "accelerated semesters".

Accelerated Semesters

10- Accelerated semesters are different in two ways.  First, every time a new quatro occurs the flunkout must leave (trading their hand for the quatro as they go).  Second, they must donate whatever college savings they have to the "scholarship fund" (a pile kept somewhere away from the study area).

11- Play continues this way until only four students remain (the "final four": the fourth, third, and second place students and the "first round survivor").

Death Semesters

12- The final four face a different challenge, what we like to call "death semesters"!  Each chooses a Player Card from their hand and lays it face down.  The professor (the latest quatro holder) turns his card over and the other students follow.  If one or more match the year of the professor's card (for example, Sophomore) they flunk out!  If all three match, the professor is survivor and the round is over.  Whenever two or more players remain, the process is repeated.  A new professor is appointed each time cards are chosen.  The new professor is the student to the old professor's left.

13- Fourth, third and second place students are allowed to keep half their college savings (the other halves go to the scholarship fund).  The survivor keeps all of her savings!  Additionally, the scholarship fund is divided equally between all students in the survivor's school!

14- The first round is closed once Degree Card points are tallied and recorded on the score sheet.  All students are then invited back for another round.  Player Cards are gathered, shuffled and dealt.  Degree Cards are redistributed as in the beginning, and the first round survivor becomes the first professor of the new round. 

15- The game is complete after four rounds.  The student with the most overall points is the ultimate, very heroic, all-knowing College Survivor!

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