We might idolize our university and college professors as authority figures who put the pursuit of knowledge and education above everything else. However, they’re as human as you or I. From time to time, these Ravenclaws take a break from unearthing the secrets of the Universe and show their gossip-loving Muggle sides in public. Or rather—online. Because the way that some students act makes it hard not to share.
Redditor Redmambo_no6 asked the professors of Reddit to share their stories about the students they encountered that made them shake their heads and wonder how they ever graduated. And, wow, some of these have made our eyebrows shoot into our hairlines. We’d say they’re unbelievable, but we’ve met students like this ourselves. Heck, we’ve been in some of these situations.
We’d love to hear which of these posts you liked the most. Be sure to slap the ‘upvote’ button and leave us a comment so we know! Now, let’s charge head forth into the weird land of (un)education.
#21
I used to TA for undergrad organic chem lab courses. Had a... challenging student once who was not great at reading directions or thinking critically. We were setting up an experiment that required GENTLE heating of a volatile solvent. I explicitly told the class, multiple times, “only turn your hot plates up to 2 when heating, these things get very hot.” Maybe 30 minutes later I’m making my rounds through the lab and I pass said guy’s fume hood and notice his reaction is smoking. I look closer and see that all of the liquid in his flask is gone and its just a charred, black smoking mess (which is still heating). I ask, “Student! What’s going on with your reaction??? What’s the temperature set at?!” The guy goes, “oh, I wasn’t sure how hot to heat it, so I just turned the plate all the way up to 10. Is my reaction going to be ok?” No, no man, it’s not going to be ok... he literally boiled the thing dry
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102points
Meanwhile, being a good professor has more to do with how you communicate with people rather than how disciplined and orderly your life is. Even the most brilliant specialist, a true Einstein in their chosen field, will be derided by their students if they’re full of themselves, dismissive of others’ views, and poke fun at their ‘colleagues-in-learning.’
#22
There have been disturbingly high numbers of students on a performance based music degree who can't read music. Not musicologists or conceptual composers who could in theory get away with it. No, these were people turning up expecting to study western classical performance.
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97points
#23
In undergrad I was taking an American history course. Our professor was from Maryland and was probably in her early forties. This kid asked her if she was one of the pearl harbor survivors. He couldn't grasp the fact that she was very much not alive at that time and that Pearl Harbor was not a harbor in Maryland.
94points
#24
I was teaching a class about college campuses in the 1960s and 70s centering on protests and activism during that time. The final paper asked the students to take an example from that time period and compare it to a more recent instance of activism on campus.
One student chose to write about instances of Martin Luther King, Jr. visiting college campuses to speak on issues of equality. That's when the student said that he had won the Nobel Prize in Sports and I just had to stop. I reread that paragraph about 10 times before I confirmed with myself that this student did indeed write what I thought they did. The rest of the paper was equally well researched and, needless to say, they did not get a good grade.
On the plus side, Martin Luther King, Jr., sports superstar, has become a running joke among my friends who were around at the time.
92points
‘Inside Higher Ed’ suggests that educators should look at students as real people and complex individuals instead of a grey and problematic mass that’s full of the new generation’s issues. There’s a lot to be said in favor of treating people as, well, people in all areas of life. Crafting genuine connections with others will always, always trump a purely mechanical approach where every student is seen as interchangeable and a ‘temporary nuisance.’
When a professor sees their students as partners in learning (however cheesy that might sound!), learning becomes a collaboration, an unending brainstorm of ideas, a feedback loop where everyone’s a learner and a teacher at the same time.
#25
I worked at my university writing center and saw a lot of really terrible writing. SO MANY poorly written essays. I really don’t know how you can graduate from high school without at least being able to perform simple tasks like “Point to your thesis statement.”
The whole point of a writing center was to teach students to correct their own work, but there was a direct correlation between how awful a paper was and how likely the student was to throw it at you and say “I’m going to go have lunch. Will you have it fixed in an hour?” then try to leave.
The tutors all got really good at an authoritative, “Stop right there! Sit down. Now let’s talk about how YOU are going to improve YOUR paper.”
The most frustrating papers were the science majors. I could never tell if the paper was terrible or I just wasn’t following the details of their experiment on chlorinated aliphatic hydrocarbons or whatever.
The absolute worst was the ENGLISH MASTERS DEGREE STUDENT who came in several times with absolute gibberish. To be fair, English was his second language but... are you absolutely sure you do not want to consider a career change, my good sir?
88points
#26
One time we had an indigenous guest speaker give a lecture about misrepresentation of First Nations culture in media at my art university. During the Q&A a student MEANT to ask the question “how do you feel about cultural appropriation of imagery from your culture by corporations?” Instead she asked “how do you feel when like H&M sells like... underwear and stuff that has like feathers on it” I have never cringed so hard in my life. The guest speaker had no idea what she was even asking him.
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79points
#27
Professor at a middle of nowhere medium sized state school with a 80-ish% acceptance rate. Had a graduate student who couldn't code for the life of him but was a software engineer at an undisclosed incredibly large aviation company. He couldn't accept that other students who didn't have jobs were better than him and that the people grading him "didn't have jobs". Sent death threats because we failed him on an assignment where his code didn't run.
He complained to the higher ups and got a C.
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76points
However friendly a professor might be, they still have to have authority in the classroom. So if their students are taking advantage of their good nature or trying to pretend they’ve read a text when they clearly haven’t, the educator has to risk being blunt and call them out on this. Politely but firmly. Bluntly but with a knowing smile.
#28
I taught a new remedial algebra class for students who had a non-traditional pre-college experience or who hadn’t taken enough math in high school to take even basic college level math.
An early section on exponents really tripped up one student. When a professor saw his grade, he instructed me to meet with the student to try to help get him on course. Upon reviewing his exam, I realized he had problems with negative numbers. I quickly sketched up a lesson about how exponents worked with negative numbers, but I was floored when his first question was “What are negative numbers?”
I spent an hour and a half working with him to no effect. I’m not even sure he even believed there was such a thing as a negative number.
An early section on exponents really tripped up one student. When a professor saw his grade, he instructed me to meet with the student to try to help get him on course. Upon reviewing his exam, I realized he had problems with negative numbers. I quickly sketched up a lesson about how exponents worked with negative numbers, but I was floored when his first question was “What are negative numbers?”
I spent an hour and a half working with him to no effect. I’m not even sure he even believed there was such a thing as a negative number.
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74points
#29
As a college freshman I took Advanced English with a student who didn’t know how to write a research paper or even possibly read (I don’t know). When I realized she didn’t know how to research, I gave her my sources and showed her how to navigate them. The next class when we were supposed to edit each other’s rough drafts. I handed her my paper to edit, she gave it back to me after 10 seconds without reading it and said it was good. She then handed me her “paper” and it was just a list of random dates.
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70points
#30
I had a student who told me, being 100% serious, that he wouldn’t be presenting on his assigned day because he 'didn’t do the assignment and he’d go the next day.'
66points
Which of these stories did you enjoy the most, dear Pandas? Are any of you professors? If so, we’d love to hear any similar stories if you’ve got any. Meanwhile, if any of you are students, let us know about the strangest and most ridiculous things your coursemates and your professors have done.