California, Pennsylvania best; Tennessee worst 

Gerald Busald is at it again.

For more than a decade, the 65-year-old math professor at San Antonio College has turned scrutiny of the Texas Lottery into a classroom project. Armed with calculators, Busald and his students have exposed false advertising, attracted the media spotlight and sparked change.

This year, Busald and his students are aiming beyond Texas. On Friday, they unveiled a ranking of every lottery in the United States based on fairness and disclosure, hoping to wield national influence on lottery best practices.

The class spent an entire semester deciding how to score the states and how much weight to put on each factor, then gathering and analyzing the data from lottery Web sites. They considered what states do with unclaimed prize money, whether they are upfront about the odds of winning and whether winnings are taxed.

"It's about truth in government," Busald said. "Telling players the truth doesn't hurt your sales."

The results? Texas ranked third behind California and Pennsylvania, scoring 64 out of 100 points. Tennessee came in last with 24 points.

Texas had the best overall Web site but was docked for its high-priced $50 scratch-off ticket and for not giving unclaimed prize money back to players. Texas now has a Spanish-language page on its Web site - which is only fair since the lottery markets to Hispanics - and has taken steps to protect players from store clerks conniving to cash in on customers' winning tickets.

California, which scored 71 points, got kudos for promptly closing scratch-off games after top prizes are gone, keeping its scratch-off ticket prices low and not collecting state income tax on prize money.

Busald's crusade against the Texas Lottery began in 1997, when his students figured out ads for the Cash 5 game were touting inflated winnings. Their calculations prompted a flurry of news reports, and lottery officials took down the ads. But they wouldn't admit they were wrong until months later.

"They totally dissed the students. That really ticked me off," Busald said.

Nowadays, Texas Lottery officials no longer ignore Busald's suggestions. Several of his recommendations over the years have been implemented, said Bobby Heith, a lottery spokesman. For example, the lottery now prints the cash value of jackpots on the back of tickets, which is important because winners get less money than advertised if they take the jackpot in a lump sum rather than in payments.

"As a state agency, you are always going to have that scrutiny," Heith said. "Sometimes people from the outside can see things we don't see, and we find it very helpful."

For students such as Lorraine Gonzales, a 39-year-old nursing major, the class has been a breath of fresh air compared with working theoretical problems in a book.

"To do a whole project and work it all the way through, that is definitely going to stick with me," Gonzales said. If that work actually prods other states to adopt better lottery practices, that would be awesome, she said.

"I told my students, if you can make a change in society, you have done something," Busald said. "Not many students get an opportunity to do that."

JimmySand9

"I also don't like that this class gives no points for high prize payouts. That is perhaps the best thing a lottery can do, other than transparency and fairness."

Since they're rating individual state lotteries it wouldn't be fair to give points for high prize payouts- how could Rhode Island or Missouri compare with Florida or New York? 

States with smaller populations just can't compete in that kind of category.

This was such a refreshing article.  These students have done a great job.  What better subject for a Statistics Class than the lottery.

They raised some points that I hadn't thought about like "free ticket" being calulating in as prizes. 

It should be a law for all states to remove scratch offs when the major prizes are gone. 

This is interesting about TN.

Just an observation – CEO compensation as much as 6 times   the national average

They are doing their jobs.LOL

This was such a refreshing article.  These students have done a great job.  What better subject for a Statistics Class than the lottery.

They raised some points that I hadn't thought about like "free ticket" being calulating in as prizes. 

It should be a law for all states to remove scratch offs when the major prizes are gone. 

This is interesting about TN.

Just an observation – CEO compensation as much as 6 times   the national average

They are doing their jobs.LOL