I just had three children pick up a rare coral collectible that I did not have before in the Collection screen. Instead of this being credited as 3000 points (1500 for each additional), only 1500 points were credited.

Has anyone else noticed this, or had this problem?

The first time you pick up a collectible it is just added in to the collection. The next time and all times after that it is paid.

(Hope I am right-- think I am right anyway lol)

You're right.
A Rare Collectible is worth...I can't remember.

rare is worth 500 tech

Common collectibles are worth 100 tech points each , uncommon are worth 250 , and rare are 1,500 each . (If they have already been collected before, of course.)

Yep. So the first child added it, and the other two collected the points. But then how were there only 1,500 points recieved... Did the last child pick it up in time?

All three children picked up the rare coral and ran to the science lab with them. I watched them, as I always do -- sort of get a kick out of seeing the points increase, you know? Especially since I was well on the way to having enough to purchase level three science.

Three kids picked up the coral -- the first one that arrived at the table, no points. Second and third arrived at table same time and only 1500 points added.

Isn't it great how people with an answer don't check the numbers to see if it applies to the problem first? Well, I should talk. With my limited ability to code, I did the same thing more than once over at the SupCom forums.

The only thing I can suggest is that either it's a bug, one of the kids got distracted somehow very near the research table so that it looked like they made the drop and they didn't, or you mis-counted. I absolutely hate making a developer error my first assumption though, since I once did that alot, and was wrong almost every time. (Unexpected! It must be a bug!)

For the record, this has happened again! A rare feather (already in collection) was picked up by two children, taken to the research table, and only 1500 points were credited. There is definitely something wrong here.

Actually, you're only supposed to be able to pick up each collectible with a single child. If the game deems to grant full credit for additional ones that you may be able to pick up, consider yourself fortunate that you got an exploit to work. If not, you got the 1500 points you should have gotten for the rare collectible.