Students may have whispered their way to a world record

Remember playing the “telephone” game when you were growing up? One person in a group whispers a message into the ear of the person sitting next to her or him, and on it goes from one to the next until the last one in line has been told.

As you might expect, what goes in the first ear isn’t always what goes in the last ear. The original message can change significantly during this primitive game of oral communication.

On Sept. 1, the residents of Sellery Hall attempted to get into the Guinness Book of World Records by conducting the largest game of “telephone” ever recorded.

UW–Madison Chancellor John Wiley and Madison Mayor Dave Cieslewicz served as the official judges of the game. The Guinness Book of World Records requires that judges witness the event.

More than half of the building’s 1,100 residents participated – 633 – and event organizers are waiting to hear if that was enough to break the record. The previous record was 614, but it will take about six months for Guinness to verify the new record.

Dora Valentin, a residence life coordinator at Sellery, says the event had a greater purpose — a chance to welcome students to their new home and to help them get acquainted.

The message spoken by the first person was “Go Big Red.” By the time it reached the end, it had changed to “UW-Madison rocks.”