20 Toxic Teachers Who've Made This Past School Year A Living Hell For Their Students, I'm Sorry To Say
Not all teachers were superheroes this year.
Warning: This post contains topics of verbal abuse, sexual assault, school shootings, rape, and antisemitism. Please proceed with caution.
1. This teacher, who grabbed her student's hearing aid because she claimed she "wasn't listening during class":
Teacher taking a child’s hearing aid as punishment “cause she wasn’t listening anyway” from iamatotalpieceofshit
She took him into the hallway and made him sit out there for two hours — he cried the whole time. I only found out because the classroom aid told me. I met with the administration, and they told me his teacher was being 'reassigned' after the school year. And since there was only a month left until school was over, it didn’t 'make sense' to move her."
"This reminds me of my sixth-grade English teacher. She caught me trying to clean a smudge off of my glasses, so she took them away from me. She moved me to the back of the class, and then gave us an assignment where we had to copy answers off the board. Since I couldn't see the board, I got a zero on the assignment, and she stood there staring at me the whole time. She didn't give my glasses back at the end of class, so my math teacher literally had to go to her class and get them back for me."
2. This teacher, who forced her student to explain why he always fell asleep in her class:
Teachers need to understand students don’t always sleep in class just cuz of laziness from awfuleverything
The kid jumped up and fell against the wall; the teacher started yelling; other students started yelling — it was chaos. A few days later, our teacher wasn't in homeroom with us (as well as the kid). We had a sub for two days.
It turned out the kid had two jobs, and would start work an hour after school and wouldn't get let out until 2 a.m. He worked because his dad was absent, and his mom was a drug addict — he needed money to feed his little brother (as well as himself). Our teacher let him sleep after that."
"In high school I was heavily medicated with prescriptions I never should’ve been prescribed. I was always sleepy, no matter how much I had slept the night before. One of my teachers was a literal medical doctor before she started teaching forensic science — I spoke to her on the first day of class and told her: 'This is what I'm taking, and these are the side effects. If I fall asleep, it's not out of boredom or lack of respect — it’s just the medication. You’re more than welcome to wake me up in front of my peers. It won't embarrass me, and I want to pay attention.'
After I told her this, she kicked me out of class and made me sit in the hallway every time I fell asleep. It was infinitely more embarrassing, and changed my grade from an A to a C."
Thankfully, not all teachers are like that:
"My senior year of high school I went through a lot of stuff — couch surfing, health issues that made it impossible to show up, unmedicated insomnia, and drug addiction. My English teacher asked me one day what was going on because my attendance was poor (and when I was there for a full day, I was usually sleeping). I told her what was going on, and she made me a little nook in a spot by her desk with pillows and blankets. She told me I could use it during any of my free periods and take a nap or decompress — no questions asked. I'm still forever grateful for her – she was a great teacher."
3. This school, which posted signs in classrooms that boys weren't allowed to use the bathroom during class:
"My sister and I have celiac disease, and she's had GERD since she was 13 years old. So, access to the bathroom is essential. Anyway, it was always a fight with the school to allow her to leave and use the restroom without explicit permission (fortunately, that never happened to me). It was a huge deal with one bad teacher in particular until my sister just started puking in her classroom trashcan and going back to her seat. I hate teachers on power trips — they know what they're doing, and how that impacts students. They just don't care."
"Someone who works for me was telling us a story about her son's first-grade teacher. He doesn't allow kids to have water in class, so they don't have to go to the bathroom. Her poor 7-year-old is stressed out when he really has to go, and is afraid to even ask."
Thankfully, not all teachers are like that:
"My favorite teacher I ever had told our class on day one we didn't have to ask to go to the bathroom — we could just go if we needed to. He was the only teacher throughout my education to ever do that. He was a very no-nonsense guy, and worked at a pace that I could actually follow. I feel like his direct teaching style really helped me remain focused. It was probably the only A I got in high school — all of my other grades were Cs."
4. This teacher, who's anti-vaxx and shamed her KINDERGARTEN students who safely got the COVID-19 vaccine:
"As a teacher, you should do everything you can for your students. You should not be in the classroom if you're this petty."
"I hope the parents of the students in her class saw that and responded appropriately. I would make her life as miserable as possible if my child were involved."
"I mean, being in the back of the class is superior, especially when your teacher is this dense. What was she even teaching? Clearly not biology."
5. This teacher, who shaved their student's hair when they caught them sleeping in class:
"The woman in the blue behind him has the right WTF expression."
"Who knows what's going on in their home life. If anything, ask the student if there's anything they can do to prevent them from falling asleep in class."
"It's been shown that school hours are actually bad for teenagers. They benefit from being able to stay up later and sleep in, so to punish them because the system has failed them is even more egregious."
"This poor student is gonna have to shave the rest of their head and wait months until it grows back to where it was before this incident. Hopefully whoever did this was properly punished."
6. This teacher, who yelled at their student for not handing in an assignment on time:
My teacher sent out this “apology” after yelling at me for not turning in the chapter assignment 24 hours before it was due. She called this “not staying on top of my work” and used this as justification for not curving out first exam. from mildlyinfuriating
"I have a similar professor this semester — she sent an email to her boss and attached the dean. She changed her tone quick. Maybe try a similar pathway?"
"Professors at my school are bullet-proof. There's a music professor at my school who drops a grade by a full letter for missing class (INCLUDING ABSENCE DUE TO COVID). This year half of his classes got together and reported him (literally 90 people went to the dean with the same report) and the dean just said, 'We'll look into it.'"
—u/AdAdditional9225 (Original poster)
7. This teacher, who punished her students for using Wikipedia as a source (when she used it to teach her class!):
8. This teacher, who had no idea how to make an online test (which ultimately made the student get a bad grade):
9. This student, who was accused of plagiarism in art class (when in reality, she sourced her own work that went viral online):
"In second grade, I decided to start writing the letter 'y' at the end of my name with a loop, like a cursive 'y.' I had no idea what cursive was at the time — I just thought it looked nice. My mother got a call from my teacher, and my teacher said that I wasn't supposed to learn cursive until third grade. So, I had to stop writing my 'y' like that."
"My fifth-grade English teacher was convinced my mother wrote my book report because it had dependent clauses in it. Apparently fifth-graders weren't supposed to know what dependent clauses were, or how to use them — so, she made me read the report out loud to her (apparently fifth-graders were also too dumb to know how to...read dependent clauses? I don't know).
A few weeks later, there was a parent night where the parents came to school to meet with the teachers. I left a handwritten note for my mother on my desk, and it contained several dependent clauses. She insisted that my homeroom teacher show it to my English teacher (I don't know if that ever happened, but it was still extremely satisfying to know my mom did that)."
10. This teacher, who was interested in teaching not only the negative effects of the Holocaust, but the "positive ones, too":
School teacher says if they’re gonna learn about the bass of the Holocaust we should learn about the goods of the holocaust from iamatotalpieceofshit
"Reading multiple sources and learning what happened from opposing sides is an important aspect of studying history, but why use such a vile example like the Holocaust?"
"This happened in Texas (and I'm from Texas) — this baffled me. Why the hell would anyone want to focus on the 'good' aspects of the Holocaust? People were lined up and slaughtered like cattle during that era — there was nothing 'good' during that time at all."
11. This school, which was culturally insensitive and encouraged their teachers to celebrate "Africa Day" in their classes:
12. This teacher, who was anything but helpful to a student after her class was cancelled last minute:
13. This school, which gave their students tardies after they enforced a parking pass check-in before classes started:
My high school was checking parking passes today, so everyone got into school fifteen minutes later than they should've. But the issue is that they didn't excuse our tardy like it wasn't their fault we were late, and they didn't even excuse everyone's tardy. tl/dr school is bullshit from mildlyinfuriating
"I was marked tardy almost every morning at my high school because of the school bus. Half the time it didn’t arrive until one minute before the bell — sometimes after. My high school was the second largest in the US, and my very first class of the day was on the complete opposite end of the building. I’m still bitter about it in my 30s."
"At my school, three tardies made up for one absence (and being absent 20 or so times made up a failing grade — even if the tardy was one minute late). Also, the teachers would close the door as soon as class started and not let you in or make up the class."
14. This elementary school teacher, who marked their student's math answers wrong just because they weren't "written to their liking":
My 6 year old sons teacher marks all of his answers with a 1 wrong because of his unique way of writing it. Even when he shows his work. He loves math and he was super bummed. from mildlyinfuriating
"Man, the 2s really irked me when my kid was learning how to write. My parents would see the correct 2 and try to get him to change it to the curly one. I went to school for drafting, where we were taught the mechanical way of writing numbers correctly, and it's not curled. I taught him how to write it correctly, and my parents tried to change it after that. They tried to pull the same thing on me as a kid when they insisted I be right-handed (I was originally left-handed, and my handwriting is equally horrible with both hands now)."
"Did you talk to the teacher?"
"No, I haven't — I've noticed this a few times, and it's only with his 1s. She'll circle it wrong instead of correcting his writing. I like the way he writes it, and it was the fact he showed his work and she clearly knew what he wrote (so it mildly infuriated me). I'll keep a closer eye on how she grades him and bring it to her attention if I keep seeing it."
—u/jarociro (Original poster)
15. This English teacher, who literally blocked the outlets in her classroom so students couldn't use their computers to write:
My language arts teacher never lets us charge our computer in class. Even though our class is towards the end of the day, she will get mad at us if we ask to charge. Today she took the step of literally putting baby-safe outlet covers and tape in the outlets so that we can’t charge our computers. from mildlyinfuriating
"Just make sure the battery is flat next time — then you can't work. She wants to play games? Then play games back."
"One of my teachers bought about six power strips for our class since people needed to charge their computers so much — there are better ways to deal with this issue."
"I had a controlling professor like this — they tried to tell us that we couldn't charge our phones because 'too many people get distracted by their phones when they should be paying attention.' Normally, all of my things were prepped before I attended class. But one day, as luck would have it, my phone was at 5% because I got into a fight the night before. I was released from the hospital around 8:15 a.m., and my class started at 9 a.m. (I arrived 15 minutes late, which obviously annoyed my teacher).
I sat down and unpacked, then plugged my phone into the wall and left it face down on my desk. She immediately asked if I reviewed the first day handout regarding phone rules, and I told her I was aware, but I was still charging my phone because it was at 5%.
After debating for two minutes, I told her I was paying $800 for the course and that I was utilizing the campus's resources to the fullest extent. Her phone rule was arbitrary due to the learning environment (we were all adults — not in high school). In the end I kept charging my phone, and about a week later, other students started doing the same. I was aware that in some areas phone usage wasn't allowed, but in a sociology course I was forced to take run by a 'Karen' wasn't the area."
16. This professor, who just told their student to "lock the doors" instead of informing the police of a suspected school shooter:
The email reads:
"Unless locking the door also activates a force field, this is dumb AF — bullets can still penetrate walls."
"What about when the gunman is already in the classroom? Then what?"
17. This teacher, who discriminated against LGBTQ+ and historically marginalized communities:
"Teacher here — fuck this. The 'safe space' sticker I have on my classroom door isn't just for show. If my students don't feel safe and comfortable to be who they are, how in the hell can they feel comfortable to learn anything?"
"Her colleagues and administrators knew about this for years and did nothing. It makes me happy that these kids stood up for themselves — they're awesome."
"So that's why I'm bisexual? Because my mom wanted me and my dad didn’t?"
18. This Spanish teacher, who used truly horrific examples in her homework assignment:
"At least they'll 'be polite' while trashing me..."
"And on top of that, the whole assignment was typed in Comic Sans — awful."
19. This teacher, who refused to wear a mask in her classroom and declared herself a "positive role model" for her students:
Her Facebook status reads:
"So Miss [redacted] was not only sans mask, but sans proper teaching credentials? It's funny how this kind of person is so opposed to actual facts."
"Gee, I thought Miss [redacted] would enlighten the masses! Seeing how proudly ignorant she's pointing to her empty head was exactly what I envisioned for that group of students."
20. And this teacher, who laced her students' cupcakes with her husband's sperm:
"What in the actual hell was wrong with this woman? How did this even become a thought in her mind? I don't understand what would've compelled her to do something like that."
"Yeah, they had video cameras all over their house so they wouldn’t miss a single second of their twisted, disturbing lives. I live in the same parish as them, and it was HUGE news when it happened — they're absolute monsters.
The husband was a high-ranking cop, and she was a school teacher, but in the privacy of their own home, they were raping and doing other unspeakable things to children and animals. It was sick."
"Their whole house was covered in surveillance equipment — audio and video. He saved his exploits to his hard drive, which was seized as part of his child pornography warrant.
Source: I’m from this parish, and the school sent a memo."
Note: Some posts have been edited for length and/or clarity.