Trying to Get Value of Hidden Field Php -- Getting Error

HTML/PHP:

            <?php if(!empty($_GET['pID'])) $the_pID = mysql_real_escape_string($_GET['pID']); 
        开发者_Go百科    #echo $the_pID;
            ?>

            <form action="inc/q/prof.php?pID=<?php echo $the_pID; ?>" method="post">            
            <select id="courseInfoDD" name="courseInfoDD" tabindex="1"><?php while($row3 = $sth3->fetch(PDO::FETCH_ASSOC)) {
                  echo "<input type='hidden' name='cID' value='$_POST['cID']'";
                  echo "<option><?php".$row3['prefix']." ".$row3['code']."</option>"; }echo "</select>"; ?>
            <input type="text" id="addComment" name="addComment" tabindex="3" value="Enter comment" />

        <input type="hidden" name="pID" value="<?php echo $the_pID; ?>">
        <input type="submit" name="submit" id="submit" />
        </form> 

PHP/MYSQL

<?php // Get select box options 
$pID3 = filter_input(INPUT_GET, 'pID', FILTER_SANITIZE_NUMBER_INT);
$username = "###";
$password = "#####";
        $pdo3 = new PDO('mysql:host=#####;dbname=####', $username, $password);
        $pdo3->setAttribute( PDO::ATTR_ERRMODE, PDO::ERRMODE_EXCEPTION );
$sth3 = $pdo3->prepare('
    SELECT pID, C.cID, C.prefix, C.code
    FROM Department D, Course C, Professor P
    WHERE pID = ?
    AND D.dID = C.dID
    AND D.dID = P.dID; 
');
        $sth3->execute(array(
            $pID3
        ));
?>

<?php

$connect = mysql_connect("#####", $username, $password) or die ("Error , check your server connection.");
mysql_select_db("####");

//Get data in local variable
if(!empty($_POST['addComment']))
    $INFOO=mysql_real_escape_string($_POST['addComment']);
if(!empty($_POST['pID']))
    $PIDD=mysql_real_escape_string($_POST['pID']);
if(!empty($_POST['courseInfoDD']))
    $COURSEE=mysql_real_escape_string($_POST['courseInfoDD']);

#print_r($_POST);
echo $the_pID;

// check for null values
if (isset($_POST['submit'])) {
$query="INSERT INTO Comment (info, pID, CName) values('$INFOO','$PIDD','$COURSEE')";
mysql_query($query)  or die(mysql_error());
echo "Your message has been received";
}
#else if(!isset($_POST['submit'])){echo "No blank entries";}
#else{echo "Error!";}
?>

I get the following error with the HTML/PHP above:Parse error: syntax error, unexpected T_ENCAPSED_AND_WHITESPACE, expecting T_STRING or T_VARIABLE or T_NUM_STRING

I feel like it deals with this line: echo <input type='hidden' name='cID' value='<?php echo '$_POST['cID']';?><option>".$row3['prefix']." ".$row3['code']."</option>"; }echo "</select>"; ?>

Does anyone see a problem here?

---

You can start with opening another PHP-tag after "option" ;-)

<?php echo '$_POST['cID']';?><option>".$row3['prefix']

Looks like you wanted to print option tag from PHP but left it outside later.