Nearly everyone had a moment during their school days when they got an assignment back with a grade that made their hearts sink.
Sometimes, they know full well why they got the grade they did, even if it doesn’t hurt any less.
On some occasions, however, students might feel like they were graded unfairly, sometimes even going so far as to confront their teachers about it.
Knowing full well they likely won’t get the response they hope.
Redditor Bridgeofincident recently worked on a group assignment with two classmates.
Despite putting in a lot of work for the assignment, the original poster (OP) was surprised by the grade she received, and didn’t hide her surprise and frustration from her teacher.
After her teacher told her parents she was “rude and disrespectful”, the OP took to the subReddit “Am I The A**hole” (AITA), where she asked fellow Redditors:
“AITA for telling my teacher she’s not allowed to give my group member a better grade?”
The OP explained why she confronted her teacher about a grade on a recent assignment:
“So I (16 F[emale]) am in a group project class. we were in groups of 3, and I was paired with Lana (16 F) and Ian (16 M[ale]).”
“We had a week to make a presentation.”
“I did the research, wrote most of the scripts, and put together the slides.”
“Lana showed up once and gave me few printed pictures for a presentation, that’s the only time she ‘helped’ then she spent the rest of the week not doing anything, Ian helped a bit, but not much.”
“We all presented and the teacher said we all did a good job, then she graded us.”
“We use different grade system.”
“Lana got 10/10, Ian got 9/10, and I got a 7/10.”
“I got upset and asked the teacher the reason she gave me the lowest grade, all she said was that Lana was ‘more confident’ during the presentation and Ian ‘helped with the visuals’.”
“I said that I did 90% of the work and that it wasn’t fair, she then said that grades are based on presentation, not effort.”
“The teacher looked annoyed and said she graded fairly and I shouldn’t be upset with her grading based on how active we were during a presentation.”
“Now my teacher is telling my parents that I was rude and disrespectful and that I’m acting like I’m entitled.”
“Lana said I was being ‘too much’ and I ‘should’ve just asked nicely’.”
“I feel like I’m not the problem.”
“If I worked the hardest i should’ve gotten the grade I deserved.”
“The teacher never explained whether the grade was based on the presentation or on effort.”
“I did present, but I wasn’t as active as the others during it.”
“I didn’t mention it earlier because I assumed the group would be graded as a whole, and since this is a new teacher, I had no idea how she graded homeworks, I just felt like my effort wasn’t reflected in the grade.”
“And I probably handled it in a most terrible way possible, but I still think the grading system is unfair and that teacher should’ve at least acknowledged the time I put in this project.”
“I got more upset when she mentioned that result mattered more than the effort which made no sense to me at all.”
“AITA?”
Fellow Redditors weighed in on where they believed the OP fell in this particular situation, by declaring:
- NTA – Not The A**hole
- YTA – You’re The A**hole
- NAH – No A**holes Here
- ESH – Everyone Sucks Here
The Reddit community generally agreed that the OP was not the a**hole for confronting her teacher about her grade.
While some felt that the OP probably should have explained how she did the bulk of the work to the teacher before the presentation, they otherwise agreed that regardless of the presentation, it was unfair that the OP was graded markedly differently than her Lana and Ian, and she did the right thing by standing up for herself:
“INFO: Did your teacher make it clear that you’d be graded on presentation only?”
“‘I did 90% of the work and that it wasn’t fair, she then said that grades are based on presentation, not effort’.”
“If your teacher didn’t make this clear ahead of time, then NTA.”- Capelily
“NTA.”
“If this is a team project, then the whole team gets the same mark.”
“Please see if you can see your teacher’s senior, principal.”
“Involve your parents.”
“What this person has done is outright favoritism.”- dragon_Porra
“As a High school teacher, this teacher sucks.”
“Everyone telling you you are wrong sucks.”
“You are 100% NTA.”
“Don’t listen to them. You are 100% correct.”
“The teacher’s lesson was inappropriate.”
“Grading based on presentation alone is a sh*tty lesson and deserves to be called out on it.”- Syric13
“NTA.”
“Your teacher took what sucks most about group presentations (one person does all the work, but everyone gets the same grade) and made it worse!”
“How can you be graded down for the presentation when without you there would be nothing to present?”- perfidious_snatch
“NTA.”
“You just learned a very important life lesson.”
“There will be people who put in the bare minimum of work but bc they have charisma, they will be rewarded while those who do the most work will be ignored, penalized or treated w condescension.”
“Unfortunately I don’t have a lot of advice for you other than to buckle down and study hard so you will have more opportunities and choices when it comes time to launch into adulthood.”
“Good luck.”- KiyoMizu1996
“NTA.”
“I hate this, and it reminds me in college in a senior class on crystal chemistry, we had two mock debates in the term.”
“For the first I had queue cards because I couldn’t keep the argument straight in my head without them.”
“In the second, I knew my stuff better and didn’t have queue cards.”
“I got a better mark having queue cards than when I didn’t.”
“Not because of my arguments, my knowledge, no, the prof thought the queue cards made it seem like I made more of an effort.”
“For a class of 8 high achieving chemists, we really hated this ‘for rent’ prof who wasn’t tenured.”
“He wasn’t good and didn’t care about fairly grading.”
“At the end, our Dean had to re-grade the whole class on a curve, so as to not affect people going to graduate school.”
“This was in 2003, FYI, before the ‘student is right’ movement.”
“All this to say, group projects always suck, and I understand your frustration.”- ilovebeaker
“NTA.”
“This is blatantly unfair.”
“However, you’re going to find this is how the world works.”
“Some people work like busy beavers to get the job done only to be instantly forgotten and never receive credit.”
“Others show up with a smile and personality with absolutely no substance and get the deal.”
“It’s infuriating, it shouldn’t work like that, but it is kind of a perfect representation of the real world.”-farmerkaren81
“NTA.”
“But I wouldn’t expect much to change.”
“You learned two valuable lessons here that I hope you will remember.”
“Group projects are a scam and you should never do all the work.”
“And, more importantly, people value behind the scenes work less than the work they can see.”-tibbles1
“NTA.”
“I had a similar problem when I did a group project when I was 11 or 12?”
“I was given a falling grade because I did all the work and my group mates knew nothing during the presentation.”
“My father escalated it all the way up to the principle of the school because we all knew I was a good kid and it was bull shit to fail me when I did all the work.”
“It started with me confronting my teacher on my own and being shoved out of the room when I started to cry.”- sluttypidge
“NTA.”
“The presentation is based on all the work (research, writing, images etc.) done in preparation of that.”
“So all of that is irrelevant?”
“And then, why even bothering with the group work?”
“The teacher is wrong and illogical.”
“If she only cared about how her students manage exposing a topic in public, then the assignment wasn’t clear.”
“And it could have been done individually.”- CanaryDisastrous232
“‘She then said that grades are based on presentation, not effort’.”
“If she really said that, that teacher ssssssuuuuUUUUUUUUUUUCCCCKKKKKKSSSS.”
“That is as ridiculous a statement as I’ve ever heard.”
“The teacher’s model of ‘presentation based grades’ does not hold water.”
“I won’t deny that clearly presenting information is very important, but if there is no information to begin with.”
“NTA.”- SoImaRedditUserNow
Had this teacher provided a rubric for how she was grading this presentation, then she would have the foundation to back up her decision.
Seeing as she didn’t seem to do this, and that the OP did the bulk of the work, it’s easier to understand the OP’s frustration, as well as her actions.
The real question is, how will this teacher grade the OP’s next big assignment?
And what will the follow up be?