School policies often leave little room for flexibility, even when students are still learning how to navigate the system.

When one teenager’s paper was given a zero over a missing name, she decided to make sure no one could ever miss her name again.

Not only did she annoy the teacher, but she later had the pleasure of realizing just how wrong this teacher really was.

You’ll want to read on for this one!

Give me a zero for no name, got it

I have a learning disability, and I’ve worked really hard to become successful academically, but when I was 14, I was still learning.

So I worked really hard on this paper for my history class, and I was really proud of it when I turned it in.

But the student soon received an unwelcome surprise.

Two weeks later, I have a zero, and when I ask why, my teacher says that I forgot to put my name in the correct spot, and he “couldn’t find it” and “college professors won’t remember your name.”

Ok, cue malicious compliance.

Consider this lesson learned!

For the next five papers, I proceeded to highlight, underline, bold, and use red ink for. Every. Single. Assignment.

It gets more obnoxious with every assignment, until finally I’m using clipart and pointing arrows at my name.

The teacher finally had enough.

Finally, my teacher tells me I’ve made my point, and could I please stop.

I do, but I also cheer when he leaves at the end of the year and is replaced by the man who made me go into history as a career.

Also, it turns out her teacher was totally wrong about college.

Also, when I was getting my associate’s at community college, I forgot my name on a paper.

My professor didn’t deduct points, and he wrote my nickname at the top.

Her teacher thought he was teaching her a lesson, but he was the one who ended up getting schooled.

How did Reddit react?

There’s a very clear disconnect between what high school teachers expect of college and the reality.

This commenter has definitely had some bad experiences with high school teachers.

This teacher just seemed overly punitive for no reason.

High school teachers really get it wrong in a lot of ways.

You play silly games, you win silly prizes!

If you liked that post, check out this post about a rude customer who got exactly what they wanted in their pizza.