Is it safe to say that at some point or another, we've all had at least one teacher who was either rude, unreasonable, detrimentally unorganized, or all three?
If so, then you won't be surprised by screenshots one student shared of an interaction they had with a professor.
In an email to their teacher, the student pointed out that a mistake may have been made on their last assignment. You see, 10 points were deducted as a late penalty but, as they said, "I properly submitted the document in a timely manner before the due date at 11:46 p.m," which was before the midnight deadline.
Instead of recognizing the issue, their professor responded by saying no mistake had been made. "The assignment was submitted 13 minutes before the posted due date," they said. "However, you must understand that it was handed in on a last-minute basis, which is the reason why you received a late penalty. As a result, I will not be removing the late penalty deduction."
This interaction — as infuriating as it is — immediately went viral online. Over 152,000 people upvoted the post on Reddit, and tens of thousands weighed in with opinions.
Most commonly, people pointed out how ridiculous it would be for a professor to apply this line of thinking to any classroom scenario.
"'You have 60 minutes to write this test.'
Hands in test in 59 minutes.
'You have to understand, that's a last-minute effort, so I'm going to deduct points for being too late,'" user u/beathelas posed hypothetically.
Also tongue-in-cheek, user u/Fuzzy_Yogurt_Bucket added:
"Time’s up! Pencils down. Those of you who just put your pencils down have failed the test because you did not turn it in in time.”
Besides the jokes, commenters were largely upset that the professor would set a due date and time but not stick to it.
"If I meet the required expectations set by YOU, then do your damn job and grade it," an anonymous commenter said. "Taking points off for poor performance is one thing, but this is just arbitrary and cruel."
The whole point of a deadline, people agreed, is for students to create their best work within the time allotted. So, it would be unfair for a professor to dock points from anyone trying to make last-minute edits or contributions before the clock struck zero.
"Does this professor not want to encourage their students to submit their BEST work? What if the student was editing and fixing as much as possible to earn a good grade? I don't understand the perspective of the professor even a little," user u/The-Man-of-Tin said.
Overall, people want this professor to be reported.
"Report it. You're paying too much for that bull," user u/ElSpudman said.
They even drafted a follow-up email for the student:
"Hello Professor," u/ceroscene suggested emailing. "I have forwarded this email to the department head and cc'd the dean. Thank you."