“Tristan,” she hesitated. “You have any advice? A way to explain Bayesian stats more on their... level?”
A half smile crossed the man’s lips, and he tucked his hair behind his ears.
Tristan was older than her, but he was also more in tune with today’s students. Had taken a more or less traditional route to his current position. Hadn’t skipped countless grades and countless more social events to reach the highest levels of the profession in record time.
“I mean, what do kids their age—what do first-year students—think about?”
Drinking and sex. And drugs.
“Drinking and sex,” Tristan said, his half smile growing into a full grin.
You forgot drugs.
Ivy cocked her head and Tristan shifted uncomfortably in his seat. His smile faded.
“But I doubt the department would go for something like that,” he added quickly.
“You’re probably right.”
Tristan lowered his eyes to the tests and then immediately raised them again. “Hey, the marks are generally bad, but Rebecca did well. Ninety-three.”
A glimmer of hope. Not surprising, though—Rebecca Quinn was one of the brightest students in the class. Pretty, too. Red hair, green eyes, freckles. Interested and interesting. A good combination. Reminded Ivy of somebody, minus the red hair and freckles. Blue eyes instead of green, but still.
“Zeke, too,” Tristan added hesitantly.
“Zeke?”
“Zeke.”
This was a surprise, and not a welcome one.
“Huh. What did he get?”
“Ninety-three.”
Alarm bells rang.
“Thesameninety-three?”
“Yep.”
Tristan flipped through the tests, found Rebecca’s and Zeke’s, and held them up.
Ivy took them and looked them over to confirm what Tristan was implying.
This wasn’t the first time that Ivy had suspected Zeke of cheating. She’d reported him once before for copying off Rebecca, no less. This was the last thing Ivy needed right now.
Or maybe not.
A close second to thinking about her father and her own project, on which she’d made zero progress over the past few months.
EC ‘25 cordially invites you to present at our upcoming conference. As a Clay Research Fellow...
Third, then.
Ivy glanced at the tests again. Zeke didn’t even try to hide it. The tests weren’t just close to the same—they were identical. If they’d both gotten perfect marks, there would be no way to tell that he was cheating. The proof, however, was in the wrong answers. It always was.
“What do you want to do about it?” Tristan asked.
