This midterm season, campus junior Epikph Ail decided to do something different with their studying habits. Instead of spending all their time watching TikTok videos or mindlessly scrolling through Instagram like everyone else, Ail decided to actually crack open the math textbook they had bought for $300. 

But when Ail opened the book, they realized it was anything but helpful. 

“The proofs were so complicated to understand,” Ail said during a rant to their friend. “Whenever they get to a particularly confusing part, they just say ‘oh this is trivial’ and move on. It’s like whoever wrote this hates students.” 

Regardless, Ail said they pushed on, reading through all of the sections assigned for the midterm. 

In addition to reading the textbook, Ail added they had redone all of the homework questions and all the practice midterms provided by the professor. In the week leading up to the midterm, Ail felt that they were ready for anything the professor could throw at them. 

Hah. If only.  

“I walked out of that test in an absolute daze,” Ail said after their midterm. “I mean look at this question: if Johnny has seven apples, and Sarah has three oranges, prove that the real part of any nontrivial zero of the Riemann zeta function is ½. What the f*** do apples have to do with anything??”

Ail later told The Daily Californian that the aforementioned problem is, quite literally, an unsolved problem in the field of mathematics. Ail said when the professor posted solutions to the midterm, the professor said the problem could be solved “at a moment’s glance.” 

When The Daily Californian reached out to the professor, they told us they had purposefully written a difficult test to “prevent cheating.” 

“Look, I allowed them to have a cheat sheet for the test, that should’ve been plenty,” the professor said. “It was also a take-home, I had to make it difficult so they wouldn’t cheat.” 

The professor added that the class average for the midterm was a “whopping 10%,” the highest the professor has ever had on a midterm, meaning that they would have to curve everyone’s grade down to reach the usual 5% average. 

However, upon further research, The Daily Californian discovered that out of a class of 10 people in Ail’s course, nine people, including Ail, received a 0% on the midterm. One student, Duznot Eventry, received a full 100% on the test. 

“What, like it was hard?” Eventry said after the test. “Bro, just plug it into the formula, it’s not that hard.” 

Eventry added that they didn’t study for the exam; rather, they spent their whole time partying. As of press time, Eventry has gone missing, with rumors alleging that the other 9 students in the class “got rid” of Eventry for ruining their curve. 

Regardless, Ail has learned their lesson. 

“I’m never studying for another midterm,” Ail said. “What’s the point, I’m going to fail anyway.”

The Daily Californian does not condone not studying. Please study for your midterms. Stop reading satire and go study, nerds.