ironpham

So today, my professor seriously dicked me. Last week we had a "conference" for my paper. We just discussed what I was going to write about and the points that I should touch on and discuss.

Later that day, I go home, and I write the paper. Over the span of about 3 days and a couple of hours each day, I finish it touching on everything he and I talked about.

Today, I get my paper back, and he failed the paper saying that those points were invalid. WHAT THE FUCK?! WE FUCKING JUST TALKED ABOUT THIS A FEW DAYS AGO!!

I emailed him after I got home and reminded him exactly what we talked about in our obviously worthless "conference" and I compared it to the essay. He emailed me back and completely ignored it. He talked about some shit about the final, which I don't give a shit about right now.

I've emailed him again, but I need to know what else I could possibly do in case he doesn't hear me this time too. Any advice at all. If he keeps ignoring me, I'm going to get more pissed off. I'm about to explode right now.

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RetroGunslinger

Is there a department head?

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snowy

Wait for the reply from your professor. If it's not to your liking, try visiting him during office hours or making an appointment and talking to him in person. Either way, try and build up some documentation to support your case--do you have notes that you took during your conference? Can you show these notes to your professor? Then, after you have talked to your professor in person, make an appointment with your department head, and talk to them about it. But you absolutely need to talk to your professor in person before doing this, and you should put together some evidence first.

At my university, you can request that a letter of complaint be put in a professor's file. If by the end of the term, you still feel wronged, follow that avenue.

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Willravel

Snowy is right, you need to build a case with solid, verifiable evidence. Having a problem with a prof is like having a problem with a cop: you have better be damned sure that when you go above his (or her) head even if they love the cop the evidence leaves them no choice.

I only really had one big problem with a prof when I was in school and I resolved that I would work it out without going above her head regardless of how unreasonable I thought she was being. I waited until I cooled off (please don't go into a meeting heated, ever) and I spoke to a bunch of friends and even a former TA of hers and came in to our meeting prepared. It took some time, but we worked it out and now we're good friends. She even helped me get a job out of school.

Bear Cub

The dean of your department, for sure, if personal negotiations fail. A friend of mine back in Engineering Ethics class got duped the same way, and the professor (who was the worst teacher I ever had in 17 years of schooling) docked him something like 3 letter grades. Turns out a number of students had reported similar problems with the same guy. He was called into a meeting with the dean, and magically 30 points appeared on his grade once posted online.

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ironpham

Thanks for the advice, guys. Of course, one of the biggest problems here is that Monday is the final. I've already planned talking to him then if he doesn't respond to my last email. But, if he doesn't change my grade after that, I'm definitely going to hit up the department head.

Thanks again, everyone.

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Bear Cub

Even if Monday is the final, almost all schools have a grace period after which grades can be altered, and its usually pretty lengthy. It compensates primarily for clerical errors and incompletes, but of course there are other circumstances as well.

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telekinetic

yeah, you basically have unlimited time to appeal grades if you are loud enough to the right people. My wife got a failing grade in a class she should have gotten an A in last semester (may), which has been preventing her graduation paperwork from going through. It was a flash class, and the professor couldn't open one of her files so she failed her.

She is just now getting it resolved.

canuckguy

That sucks man, I hope your able to get a resolve and improve your grade.

I had a prof in uni who was similar to that, all verbal communication and once you did the work it never matched what he had in his head. I suspected he was jaded towards me (i rarely attended the lectures) and he used that as a bias against me even though class attendance was not a component of the overall grade.

Before our final papers I took my completed assignment to a different prof in the same department and asked her to give my paper a once over and offer a grade assessment explaining to her that i really needed to "nail" this class.
She gave me an A- or something like that, then I took that same paper untouched and submitted it to my prof who gave me a fucking D. I then took both papers to do the dean and asked to be explained why one prof gave me an A while another a D on the same paper, same department.

The prof in question hated my guts afterward (my mark was changed) but I was really pissed about it. Since it was my major I ended up transferring schools to avoid that jerk since I was going to have to deal with him the next year. How sad.

Tully Mars

I'm certain tactics such as this work. But the end result was you having to attend an entirely different school the following year. I'd follow snowy's advice on this, it's spot on, IMHO. My daughter got into a pissing match with a criminal justice professor while attending a small community college. The professor (who was also a local attorney) took a leave of absence due to a family emergency and failed to leave everyone instructions on how to take the final exam. My daughter had repeatedly contacted the dean and dept. head asking what she should do regarding the final. Each time she was told "Just wait for the professor to return, we're sure she'll let you take it." When the professor returned nearly two months later she gave my daughter an "F" for failing to take the final. Turns out she had my daughter's e-mail incorrect. The professor claimed it was my daughter's responsibility to ensure she had the correct e-mail. My daughter scheduled a meeting with the professor and dept. head. I talked with the dean and dept. head they seemed concerned about the professors behavior. They each told me they thought the situation was not being handled well by the professor. Sounded to me like there was going to be a reasonable solution to the the situation. Then my daughter ended up telling the professor, over the phone, she was either going to change the grade, let her take the final or my daughter was going to get her fired. Yeah, that went over well. In my daughter's defense her fiancée had just been killed and she was under a lot of stress. But after that phone call, which the professor recorded, no one seemed willing to support my daughter's side and she has that "F" on her record to this day.

Bottom line is getting into a power struggle with someone in power is a dangerous game. It's a game you're more then likely to lose. It can be won, but usually the cost is pretty high.

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snowy

This is precisely why I structured my advice the way I did and emphasized trying to work things out with the professor first and foremost--going above his head or going to someone else in the department should be a last resort.

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Tully Mars

I've found this advice is good for most of life's situations, not just academia. Though professors and instructors can be especially power hungry in my experience. 20+ years ago while working as a volunteer EMT I signed up for a basic Red Cross first-aid course at Western Oregon State. I took the course as an easy "A" elective. Turns out the PE/health instructor/football coach had two meat heads from the football team "teaching" the course. I almost found myself falling into a power struggle over the way they were running the course. I found myself biting my tongue a lot. Thinking things like "No, we stopped clearing airways that way five years ago due to neck injuries." And "that's not even the correct chest compression to breath ratio for single person CPR." I kept my mouth shut and took my "A." I did end up having a conversation with the "coach" after grades came out. But I did it in a tactful polite manner.

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roachboy

first off, if you make this adversarial, you cannot win.

second: believe it or not the folk who teach courses are also human beings. they are not parental figures, so there's no need to impute some omniscience to them that they betray when a mistake happens.

subpoint: summer courses are a pain in the ass. they move very fast. it is more tiring to teach them than it is to take them. trust me on this one--i have taught at the university level for quite a long time. so things can happen. mistakes can happen, misreadings can happen.

if i were you, i'd try to make an appointment for directly after the final. like that day or the day after--don't wait--although it's not fatal if you do because grades can be changed, it won't help anything. get it over with.

now to the part you're not going to like:

third: it is possible that your paper sucks.
i know i know, the jewels that issue forth from the mind of almost any undergraduate are a priori genius and it is inconceivable that this paper was not also genius and so obviously not doing well on it must have been a mistake. blah blah blah.
and you spent THREE WHOLE DAYS on it.

THREE WHOLE DAYS.

so a bit of time has passed between the posting of the op and now, so maybe that's enough distance to have a look at the paper from a viewpoint not entirely determined by the assumption that whatever you write must be genius and that the evil professor misread it and have a look. maybe it sucked. maybe it didn't. but you have to be able to argue the case that it didn't suck from a remove. you have to be able to show how it works and why the moves that you use are there.

and like i said, if you make this adversarial, you cannot win.
if you think a department head is going to overrule a professor on a grade---unless it is egregious and you can demonstrate that--you're fooling yourself.


if it turns out that the paper does in fact suck, then suck it up and deal with it. learn from it. try to find out why it sucks, if it does, and change how you work.
if it doesn't suck, then i wish you the best if navigating this. generally, it's easier than you think. but there are folk who are jerks on all sides of such things.

make your case as clearly and dispassionately as you can.
be nice.
you'll either improve the grade or you wont.
it's not the end of the world either way.

good luck.

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