The Investigative Classmate is a poetic narrative intended to amuse the audience concerning someone's character, originating in The Temptation of Slobs. The rules of the form are applied by poets to produce individual poems which can be recited. The poem is a single tercet. The Investigative Classmate is always written from the perspective of the author. The third line of the tercet contrasts the underlying meaning of the second line. The first line has three feet with a syllable weight pattern of long-long (quantitative spondaic trimeter). The second line must make use of assonance. It has five feet with a syllable weight pattern of short-short-long (quantitative anapaestic pentameter). The third line has five feet with a syllable weight pattern of long-short-short (quantitative dactylic pentameter).