Abstract:
A method for motivating students to improve their grade point average using a network system, comprising the steps of inputting into the network system a student&#39;s current class schedule; generating wagering odds for the student to achieve first grades for current class schedule; communicating possible wagering odds between the network system and the student resulting in finalized wagering odds; accepting the finalized wagering odds; achieving, by the student, second grades for the current class schedule at the end of a current term; and if the second grades are at least equal to the first grades, rewarding the student in accordance with the accepted wagering odds.

Description:
FIELD OF THE INVENTION 
     The present invention relates to an online system and method for motivating students to improve their grade point average that allows a student to wager that grades received will be at least as good, if not better than grades predicted. 
     BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 
     Success in the academic arena is based, primarily, upon the grades a student achieves during his or her scholastic career. And, of course, a successful academic career results in a promise for a successful future profession (both monetarily and emotionally). Thus, the desire to achieve the highest possible grades is a common sentiment for all students. However, students do not try their hardest throughout their school careers. Often the desire to achieve good grades may wane as a student&#39;s class schedule gets difficult and/or as the student gets busy with other outside interests. Thus, the delayed benefits of achieving good grades are sometimes insufficient motivators. It is a constant challenge to devise ways to motivate students throughout their academic careers to achieve the highest possible grades that they can. 
     Juxtaposed with the desire to achieve good grades is the very natural human desire to successfully gamble, or wager something of material value on an event with an uncertain outcome with the primary intent of winning additional money and/or material goods. Though many participate in gambling as a form of recreation or even as a means to gain an income, gambling can become a psychologically addictive and harmful behavior in some people, and some gamblers persist in gambling even after repeated losses. What is needed is a system that transforms a popular yet potentially addictive and harmful activity into an activity that will improve a person&#39;s life and emotions. 
     SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION 
     Accordingly, the present invention is directed to a method and system that substantially obviates one or more of the problems due to limitations and disadvantages of the related art. The present invention provides a method for motivating students to improve their grade point average using a network system while allowing them to enjoy the pleasures of successfully placing wagers on the network system. 
     It is an object of the invention to provide a method that will motivate students throughout their academic careers to achieve the highest possible grades that they can. 
     It is another object of the invention to provide a method of allowing a student to wager that grades received will be at least as good as an objective prediction of what grades the student could achieve, thus motivating a student to generally improve. 
     Another object of the invention is to ensure that whatever wagers are made will insure that the wagerer may still profit from the experience, whether or not the wager results in monetary gain since throughout the wagering period the student will be improving academically. 
     Additional features and advantages of the invention will be set forth in the description that follows, and in part will be apparent from the description, or may be learned by practice of the invention. The objectives and advantages of the invention will be realized and attained by the method that is particularly pointed out in the written description and claims hereof as well as the appended drawings. 
     To achieve these and other advantages and in accordance with the purpose of the invention, as embodied and broadly described, the present invention provides a method for motivating students to improve their grade point average using a network system, comprising the steps of inputting into the network system a student&#39;s current class schedule; generating wagering odds for the student to achieve first grades for current class schedule; communicating possible wagering odds between the network system and the student resulting in finalized wagering odds; accepting the finalized wagering odds; achieving, by the student, second grades for the current class schedule at the end of a current term; and if the second grades are at least equal to the first grades, rewarding the student in accordance with the accepted wagering odds. 
     Another aspect of the invention provides a method for motivating students to improve their grade point average using a network system, comprising the steps of inputting into the network system a plurality of student&#39;s current class schedules; generating wagering odds for each of the plurality of students to achieve first grades for current class schedule; communicating possible wagering odds between the network system and the plurality of students resulting in finalized wagering odds for each student; accepting the finalized wagering odds by at least one of the plurality of students; achieving second grades by the at least one of the plurality of students for the current class schedule at the end of a current term; and rewarding the at least one of the plurality of students in accordance with the accepted wagering odds. 
     A further aspect of the invention is a method for motivating students to improve their grade point average using a network system, comprising the steps of inputting into the network system a plurality of student&#39;s current class schedules; generating wagering odds for each of the plurality of students to achieve first grades for current class schedule; communicating possible wagering odds between the plurality of students resulting in finalized wagering odds for each student; accepting the finalized wagering odds by at least one of the plurality of students; verifying second grades achieved by the at least one of the plurality of students for the current class schedule at the end of a current term; and rewarding the at least one of the plurality of students in accordance with the accepted wagering odds. 
     It is to be understood that both the foregoing general description and the following detailed description are exemplary and explanatory and are understood to provide further explanation of the invention as claimed. 
    
    
     
       BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS 
       The accompanying drawings, which are included to provide a further understanding of the invention and are incorporated in and constitute a part of this specification, illustrate embodiments of the invention that together with the description serve to explain the principles of the invention. 
       In the drawings: 
         FIG. 1  illustrates an example of a local area network (LAN)  100  that is connected to the Internet and in which the inventive method may be utilized. 
         FIG. 2  illustrates the TCP/IP Layering Model. 
         FIG. 3  is a flow chart illustrating the steps of a first embodiment of the present invention. 
         FIG. 4  is a flow chart illustrating the steps of a second embodiment of the present invention. 
         FIG. 5  is a flow chart illustrating the steps necessary for recalculating odds of a wager according to an embodiment of the present invention. 
     
    
    
     DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS 
     Reference will now be made in detail to the preferred embodiments of the present invention, examples of which are illustrated in the accompanying drawings. The present invention described below extends the functionality of the inventive system and method for online electronic trading of assets. 
       FIG. 1  illustrates an example of a local area network (LAN)  100  that is connected to the Internet and in which the inventive system and method may be utilized. LAN  100  comprises a server  102 , four computer systems  104 ,  106 ,  108 ,  110 , and peripherals, such as printers and other devices  112 , that may be shared by components on LAN  100 . Computer systems  104 ,  106 ,  108 ,  110  may serve as clients for server  102  and/or as clients and/or servers for each other and/or for other components connected to LAN  100 . Components on LAN  100  are preferably connected together by cable media, for example unshielded twisted pair (UTP) Category 5 copper cable, and the network topology may be an Ethernet topology  114 . It should be apparent to those of ordinary skill in the art that other media, for example, fiber optic or wireless radio frequency media, may also connect LAN  100  components. It should also be apparent that other network topologies, such as Token Ring, may be used. 
     Data may be transferred between components on LAN  100  in packets, i.e., blocks of data that are individually transmitted over LAN  100 . Routers  120 ,  122  create an expanded network by connecting LAN  100  to other computer networks, such as the Internet, other LANs or Wide Area Networks (WAN). Routers are hardware devices that may include a conventional processor, memory, and separate I/O interface for each network to which it connects. Hence, components on the expanded network may share information and services with each other. In order for communications to occur between components of physically connected networks, all components on the expanded network and router  304   s  that connect them must adhere to a standard protocol. Computer networks connected to the Internet and to other networks typically use TCP/IP Layering Model Protocol. It should be noted that other inter-networking protocols may be used. 
       FIG. 2  illustrates the TCP/IP Layering Model, which is comprised of an application layer (Layer 5)  202 , a transport layer (Layer 4)  204 , an Internet layer (Layer 3)  206 , a network interface layer (Layer 2)  208 , and a physical layer (Layer 1)  210 . Application layer protocols  202  specify how each software application connected to the network uses the network. Transport layer protocols  204  specify how to ensure reliable transfer among complex protocols. Internet layer protocols  206  specify the format of packets sent across the network as well as mechanisms used to forward packets from a computer through one or more routers to a final destination. Network interface layer protocols  208  specify how to organize data into frames and how a computer transmits frames over the network. Physical layer protocols  210  correspond to the basic network hardware. By using TCP/IP Layering model protocols, any component connected to the network can communicate with any other component connected directly or indirectly to one of the attached networks. 
       FIG. 3  is a flow chart illustrating the steps of a first embodiment of the present invention. As shown in  FIG. 3 , a student logs onto the grade wagering network system, and inputs his/her current class schedule and school at step  10 . The student&#39;s school transcript also may be input into the network system at step  20 . The transcript will indicate the specific past classes and grades achieved in those classes by the student. The transcript may be an official transcript from the student&#39;s school, or may be a listing provided by the student, which can be verified later by the network system. Alternatively, the network system may download an official transcript from the school using an authorized pass code. Other methods of obtaining a school transcript will be known to those skilled in the art and are incorporated herein. 
     Armed with this information, other data relating to both the classes already attended by the student and the prospective classes may be input into the network system. For example, at step  30  the grade distribution for the classes submitted by the student may be retrieved by the network system or input into the network system. Grade distribution may be defined as a percentage of students who received A&#39;s, B&#39;s, C&#39;s, D&#39;s and F&#39;s for that class. The grade distribution also may be broken up for statistical purposes into an average and a standard deviation. This data may span a certain number of class offerings, a certain number of years, or may be determined for a particular professor. This information may be obtained from the school or from online course reviews. Other types of data and procedures for obtaining the data will be known to those skilled in the art and are part of this disclosure. Based upon this data, the network system may calculate an objective rating for each class (both completed classes and prospective classes) at step  40 . 
     Using the objective ratings for each class calculated above, the network system then determines odds for the student to achieve certain grades for the student&#39;s current class schedule at step  50 . For example, if the student&#39;s class schedule includes Calculus, Chemistry, English, and American History, the network system may predict with a certain confidence level that the student will achieve a B in Calculus, an A in Chemistry, a B in English, and a C in American History. This prediction may be presented to the student with the objective that the student and the system may enter negotiations for the student to place a wager, at step  60 , for each class. The student may change the odds in the wager by placing an alternative prediction of grades. For example, the student may believe that it is possible to achieve an A in Calculus and a B in American History, and may include a different prediction in the wager. Moreover, the student may communicate with the network system to negotiate better odds than predicted. For example, the student may propose a grade for a particular class (the grade being higher than what the network system predicted) and also the payoff odds and then allow the network system to either reject or accept the bet. 
     The network system calculates the wagering odds using the prediction for each grade, the profit margin the network system requires (i.e., the percentage of the wager that the network system will retain), and the amount of the wager the student is placing on each class. Of course, the “odds” increase if the student predicts a higher grade than what the network system predicts. Thus, the wagering odds may vary with each class in the current class schedule. 
     The student either accepts or rejects the wagering odds at step  70 . If the student rejects the wagering odds, no wager is finalized and the procedure terminates. On the other hand, if the student accepts the wagering odds, the transaction may be finalized by input of consideration by the student. Depending on the local, state, and federal laws and rules, a student may input credit card information, a credit check and subsequent validation may occur, a third party payment plan may be implemented, etc. Other payment plans and schedules will be known to those skilled in the art and are incorporated into this specification. 
     At the end of the term, the student&#39;s official transcript is sent to the network system in step  80 . The official transcript may be sent by the student or by the college on behalf of the student, or the network system may have access to the school&#39;s database using an authorized pass code. Other techniques will be known to those skilled in the art and are incorporated into this specification. At step  90 , the grades achieved are compared to the predicted and wagered grades. For each class, if the student achieves at least what was predicted, at step  95  the student is rewarded according to the wagering odds that were accepted at the beginning of the term. In an alternative embodiment, if the student&#39;s grades are better than predicted and wagered, the reward increases. The reward is calculated for each class; thus, the student may “win” for some classes and “lose” others. 
     The reward may be a credit sent to the student&#39;s credit card (if that was how the wager was placed), may be sent as a check, or may be made through a third party payment plan. Other reward payment plans and schedules will be known to those skilled in the art and are incorporated into this specification. An alternative option is to use the student&#39;s reward as payment for a wager relating to the next semester. 
     A second embodiment of the present invention is shown in  FIG. 4 . In this embodiment, students may compete with each other and the network system. As shown in  FIG. 4 , and similar to  FIG. 3 , each student logs onto the grade wagering network system and inputs his/her current class schedule at step  400 . Each of the student&#39;s transcripts also may be input into the network system at step  410 , which will indicate the specific past classes and grades achieved in those classes by each student. As discussed previously, other data relating to those classes may be input into the network system at step  420 , such as retrieving a grade distribution for the classes submitted by each student. Grade distribution will be as defined above. Based upon this data, the network system may calculate an objective rating for each class for each student at step  430 . 
     Using the objective ratings for each class calculated above, the network system then determines odds for each student at step  440 , which may include a handicap. For example, the network system may predict that one student must achieve one letter grade above another betting student in order to win, or the network system may increase the payoff for one student over the others should that student achieve the grades designated. As discussed earlier, the students may negotiate their wagers by placing alternative predictions of their respective grades, or the grades of each other, or the odds, etc., at step  450 . 
     The students either accept or reject the wagering odds at step  460 . As shown in  FIG. 5 , if some of the students reject the wagering odds, the network system may recalculate odds for the remaining students for re-wagering (step  470 ) and/or further negotiation between students and the network system (step  475 ). Alternatively, the wagering odds may remain the same. 
     Once the wagers are in and the wagering odds are accepted, the transaction is finalized as described above, and the final grades are awaited. As shown in  FIG. 4 , once the final grades are awarded, the betting students&#39; grades are sent to the network system in step  480 , the network system compares the grades to the predicted and wagered grades at step  485 , and the winners are awarded the appropriate amounts at step  490 . 
     As an alternative, the network system may be used by students as a forum in which to place bets against each other without network system intervention, except for the collection and distribution of bets. In this embodiment, the students log onto the network system and negotiate only with each other. The students determine the odds and wagers using the network system as an objective third party money manager. The network system may retain a percentage of the wagers. Also, the students may request that the network system assist in calculating the payoff amounts once wagering odds are decided. 
     The foregoing description has been directed to specific embodiments of this invention. It will be apparent, however, that other variations and modifications may be made to the described embodiments, with the attainment of some or all of their advantages. Therefore, it is the object of the appended claims to cover all such variations and modifications as come within the true spirit and scope of the invention.