Courageously Battling a “Metaphorical Teacher’s Assistant”

When I was in school, I loved to battle against those who thought they had power, but actually were employed by my tuition. One group of people who were especially fun to harass were the TA’s. These were former students, some even my age or younger, who decided that instead of using their degree to get a job, they would use it to look down at newer students. Publicly they would say that the job was difficult but they did it because they loved the students. They would express this love with notes in our papers like “really? This isn’t what I thought,” “you lost me here,” “you seem distant” and my all-time favorite “C+, your paper really moved me.” They also have to go back and listen to the same lectures they heard before. Yes, they get paid now, but someone also pays the guy to clean out my sink after I tried to store leftovers down there.

But it turns out, that as soon as you let them know that you are actually their boss, things start to turn. They freak out if you have any sort of connection with the professor, in case you would turn this against them.  They always have to be on their best behavior when they are at school, so you can be a raving lunatic and they are expected to exhibit “good ego strength”.  And since all grading at my school is blind (the TA’s don’t know whose paper they are grading) I can be as big of an ass as possible and still expect the same dumbass comments I would get if I was kind and gentle and had self control.

One time I was taking a class on the Old Testament, and in the theme of judgment and retribution that we covered in class, the TA decided to use his power and teach us a lesson. He told us to write the percentage of reading we had done for the class on the back of our final. I don’t know why Christian Schools insist on grading students for the amount of reading we finish, but they do. Can you imagine a state school asking students to write the percentage of reading they did, and they would be graded on it? Anyway, I forgot to put my percentage on the back of my final, as did over half of my class. The following is an email I received.

If you are receiving this email, it’s because you omitted your reading report for Old Testament Genre on your final exam.
Per our in- class instructions and the course syllabus, this was expected to be included. Unfortunately, a 10% penalty (1 total point) will be applied for your late submissions.
Please respond to this email by Monday, July 28th with the amount of the material you successfully read by June 27th (the date you finished the final exam). If you finished more of the course material within this last month, DO NOT include this in your reading report as it does not count.
Please let me know if you have any questions.

To which I replied

All grade policies must be on the syllabus, and the syllabus does not say you can dock me for turning in a late reading report, so you can’t dock me for any points. I also read 110% of the reading, so even if you dock me, I would like all 10 points. Since we are being evaluated for accreditation, I trust that you will be very careful in following the rules. Also I emailed (the other TA) immediately after the final, so I would hope that would count for something.

Have a nice day
Derrick Fudge

His response to my written thumping of his manhood

(The other TA) mentioned a couple folks emailed him after the final, but didn’t say who. So if you did then you’ve got nothing to worry about.

I love how he completely ignores the fact that not only did I claim to do 110% of the reading, but I also challenged his understanding of his own job. I wonder if he read my email and thought “this guy looks like he is worrying a lot, I should let him know he has nothing to worry about.” If he thought that, he was wrong. The only thing I was worrying about was having to watch where I stepped after I metaphorically turned him into a giant pile of poo.