Move over, Regis. Come Friday, nobody is going to want to be a millionaire. Instead, all attention at Iowa State will be focused on bringing home the ultimate goal — winning KURE’s KaleidoQuiz 2000.

There’s no million dollar prizes up for grabs, or possible marriages with millionaires for that matter. There is, however, the possibility of bringing home a KURE house party, free pizza, a six-foot sub or numerous other things Iowa State’s student radio station KURE has come up with. But the most prestigious prize of all is knowing that your team survived 26 grueling hours of trivia and scavenger hunts.

KaleidoQuiz Director Casey Houston said the biggest reason to do KQ is for fun.

“It’s not really for the prizes, I think it’s just to flex your brain power and do some quick and hard research and see how good you are at it,” Houston says.

This year will mark the 35th annual KaleidoQuiz, which was started in the mid-’60s to help students deal with the dreaded cabin fever. Due to time restraints this year, KURE was forced to move it until after spring break.

According to KURE public relations director Christina Kitson, KQ will still be a great way to burn off some tension and have a lot of fun.

“It gives students something to put their energy into instead of just sitting in their dorm room. It’s twenty six-hours where every six minutes a question is being read, and there are scavenger hunts and all these other things going on at the same time,” Kitson says. “If you’re bored it’s because you’re not participating enough.”

The rules of the game go like this: Teams can consist of any number of members. Trivia questions will be broadcast over KURE 88.5 FM, and then each team has six minutes to call in the answer.

That’s not all. During the 26 hours of trivia, each team is also involved in scavenger hunts and traveling questions. This part seems to be the biggest hit with the students, giving them a break from the trivia and a chance to put their creative powers to work.

“The trivia questions are still going on while you’re doing the traveling questions,” Houston says. “It’s a good chance for you in the middle of the 26 questions to say ‘all right, you four guys try to go round up these items,’ you can get away from the game for a while.”

Creativity and determination have been the cornerstones of the scavenger hunt in prior years, as students have proved they will go to any length to bring back the requested items.

Houston, who is on his third year of duty as the KQ director, recalls having students fetch a wide variety of items for the scavenger hunt in past years.

Last year, one of the demands was to bring in as many empty Mountain Dew cans as possible, which in result found Hy-Vee being bombarded with college students interested in buying cans from the redemption center.

Other things that have been requested during the scavenger hunt are moon boots, female condoms, He-Man action figures and matchbooks from Mystic Lake Casino in Minnesota.

So how does one go about locating such hard-to-find items?

Compromise and use your imagination.

“Just contact all the people you know, or if you can’t think of anything, just be creative and create your own,” says Steve Decker, captain of the Purple Monkey Bandits and veteran of the KaleidoQuiz. “Usually they are pretty lenient on the scavenger hunt.”

The game doesn’t end at trivia and scavenger hunts, though. The teams also listen to 20 music or movie montages, which last about one to two minutes. Then the team must list the titles of the movies or songs, and the actors, actresses or artists who performed them.

All of these activities are spread out over the twenty-six hour contest. So competitors must be prepared to do some serious thinking, and possibly lose some serious sleep.

“A lot of people take a nap in the afternoon on Friday before it starts so they can stay up really late,” says Kitson, who has shed her public relations role during previous KaleidoQuizzes to help work the phones. “The participants tend to sleep more than the people working the phones do.”

Entry forms are due today by 5 p.m., and Houston is expecting a pretty good turnout for this year’s contest, especially since Monday saw eight teams already submitting applications.

No matter how many contestants there are, the KaleidoQuiz is sure to provide plenty of excitement and mayhem for everyone involved.

“It’s just a lot of fun,” Decker says. “It lasts so long and you’re doing five things at once. There’s just a lot of madness involved.”