While in school, most students will have to write papers for various different classes. This not only helps them to learn about the subject at hand, but also how to properly write an academic paper.

What would you do if you worked really hard on a paper and when you turned it in, you got a bad grade and the teacher told you it is because you used too many different sources?

That is what happened to the student in this story. He was so upset about it because he worked very hard on the paper. As a way to get revenge, he did the exact opposite on the next paper.

Read on to get all the details of this story and see if you think the teacher was out of line for grading so harshly.

Highschool teacher’s source-phobia

In my Freshmen year of high school (I am not from the US, so I try “translating” this post into “American” English) we had a chemistry teacher called Mr. Beesting.

Now, Mr. Beesting is a real nice guy or so I thought.

One day we were all assigned a topic, to make an essay on. I had to choose between boron, aluminum, and gallium (I took gallium).

One thing you need to know about me is, that I am not a very good student, but I like science. So when Mr. Beesting wanted us to make this project I, of course, was quite thrilled.

He is going to do his best to turn in a great report.

So as soon as I had gotten home I immediately started work on my “magnum opus”. It took about 12 hours total for a 3-page essay, but when I had finished, I was thrilled, I even had a teacher look over my essay and he absolutely loved it, so I was sure I’d get an A.

But no! Mr. Beesting has given me a C, which admittedly is not too bad, but his reasoning freaked me out, he said and I quote, “Well dear, you wrote too many sources in the essay just so you could impress me, now that doesn’t work with me. Your attempt in manipulating me has impacted your rating. Think about what you have done, I expect better from you!”

He only used how many sources were necessary to get the point across. And even if it was to many, marking them down to a C seems quite excessive.

I like using 6 sources, which I clearly needed to cover all the THRILLING parts of gallium extraction in China, but he wouldn’t have any of it!

Instead of being angry, I complied and when we had to write a report on “urban mining” I used no sources in the process since he had written “Don’t use sources” with a red, shiny pen on my last essay.

While funny, he should have known not to use zero sources.

Expectedly I got a D and he’s said: “You know, you should have used sources. Why didn’t you learn that by now, this school is not a kindergarten”

I had been quiet for the rest of class with a smug smile in my face and as soon as school was over I rushed to the headmaster’s office, having brought both essays with me and explaining myself.

Needless to say, the teacher never gave me a worse grade for using too many sources again.

At the end of the day, while this story is funny, the student was wrong and deserved the poor grades. They should have known to use a proper number of sources for each paper.

Check out what the people in the comments have to say about this story.

Here is a teacher who is upset about the situation. Teachers can grade how they want, but they should do it consistently and fairly.

Who would want to read a paper like this?

Wow, this person endured something even worse. How can any teacher think that this is fair.

This chemistry teacher isn’t happy with what the teacher in the story did.

Some teachers want you to have a citation for everything in a paper. Others want you to have very few.

Whenever you have to write a paper in school, you need to keep in mind what the teacher actually wants. Writing for a specific audience is an important skill to learn.