Student Excuses

I really need to go over to Rate Your Students and enter something. That site keeps me sane while I'm teaching. What I would probably post about would be the excuses I've gotten from students for various issues that've come up for them.

Everybody has what we jokingly call the "my grandmother died" excuse. Sometimes that really happens, but most of the time it doesn't. And it's a great excuse, because only a hardened asshole will ask for proof of that. I just usually say, "You get three absences for free. Doesn't matter what the excuse is. After that, it'll affect your grade." Here are some of my favorites thus far--note, all grammar concerns are intentionally left in:

I wanted to let you know why I have missed class on Friday and Monday. This past weekend I got hit in my face with a sled from a little kid. Ever since then I've had a nonstop headache. The headache had gotten so bad that I was on my knees begging to be taken to the hospital. I had a spinal tap and anything and everything else. They have found blood in my spinal tap, therefore I am not free from further tests.

Am I being too suspicious if I ask for the spinal tap proof? Because that's really weird. She came to class grimacing, so maybe it happened, maybe it didn't.

Here's one telling me why he didn't make the meeting that we'd had to set up for yet the fourth time because he missed all the other ones:

Okay my bad, I had a rough Thirsty Thursday... If it works out for you
Monday around 11.30 I PROMISE I'll be there this time.

This particular student kept me two hours past the time when I could've left and done more productive things elsewhere, only to have to give up on him 15 minutes after he was supposed to show up.

Here's a lovely one complaining to me about why having cancelled class for bad weather really sucked for him:

this snow day really puts me in a hard place, i was actually going to sign up for my conference on wednesday so that it would be possible for me to go home for the weekend. now that we have peer review on monday instead of friday, it is really screwing me over, is there something else i could do so that i still get credit for it?

Um, yeah, I'll take your weekend into consideration next time I'm judging the hazards of driving on ice.

Here's one from a student who completely missed her turn on an assignment that I told her about face to face after class:

We did discuss it briefly, but I guess it was just brought to my
attention at last minute so I was caught off guard. I knew the
assignment, I just wasn't sure when to e-mail it to you. You may of
told me when to do so, so I do realize I may be at fault so I will
deal with the consequences but please let me know if a chance comes up
to make up for it.

This was after I explained it to her thoroughly, she said she understood, I told her to email it to me when she was finished, and I still fail to see my fault in this screw up.

But one of my favorites was from a student last semester who was highly disappointed that he had gotten a "D" in the class (A "D" in this class means you have to take it over). The grammar alone delights me:

How did I get a D that is impossible. I do not understand how that is
possible you said you would not remove my absence points if I did not
miss again. I also started talking more. Please get back to me very soon.

As he astutely observed in his own grammatically bizarre way, I didn't take his absences into consideration. He had five, which would have put him at a D anyway. By "talking more," I believe the young man is refering to "participation," which I had to explain to him did not qualify as talking to your friends. He thought one of his papers deserved an A because I had said it was "the best paper he'd done in this class." Which was true. I then had to explain to him that just because it was his best paper didn't mean it was an "A" paper.

Ah, cold, hard reality.

-- Virgil