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Did my University Wrong Me?


Mike Hawk

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Posting this because I'm debating this on taking to my department because IMO this is incredibly unethical and wrong. I'll tell everything completely unbiased though so everyone can make their own opinion. (This is University btw).

 

I strongly recommend you read the detailed version, but people will complain this is long so:

 

tl;dr

 

 

Teacher gave out practice exam to a few students, exam turned out to be the actual final and was supposed to be kept a secret, but i didn't know so I sent it to my peers. Professor gets mad, but then forgives me. Next semester I find out all my friends finished with A's while I finished with a B which didn't match up with the grades I got

 

 

 

So in my class, we made a massive group chat amongst all the students. We would use this as a resource for if we missed a homework assignment, needed help on a problem, missed class and wanted to know what happened, ask for handouts they might've missed, etc. 

 

Fast forward to the end of the semester, the weekend before finals. I let my professor know i'm coming by his office to turn in some late homework, and he replies that he left a practice exam in his mailbox for me to try before our final. I grab the practice exam and begin working on it. I bring up this practice exam in the group chat mentioned above, and people who didn't get it ask if I can post a picture of it so I do.

 

A few minutes later, someone from the class messages me individually basically saying the practice exam was a secret. That the "practice exam" Is actually just the final, and that the professor only intended on giving it to students who stopped by his office. I was never told nor made aware of this until this moment.

 

I immediately do everything I can do get the pictures deleted, and do so within 20-30 minutes. Approximately 1-2 hours later my professor texts me saying he knows I posted pictures, and that I'm in trouble. I head to his office to try and explain and when I walk in he says "Why would you do that? Now I have to rewrite the exam." I tell him I didn't know it was a secret, no one told me and then I was told to get out.

 

2 days later my professor texts me again saying "I know it was an accident, all is forgiven. You can come by my office again to go over any questions you have on the final"

 

Next day take the final, do very well, finish the class with a B. Upon leaving the test room people ask me what test I got and i'm like what? And I find out that some students still got the exact same final as the practice exam. I'm like whatever, no big deal.

 

Fast forward to now, the next semester. I talk to a few of my peers who were doing about the same in the class prior to the final (as in we all had around an 82-85%). And turns out, they all finished with A's in the class. I talk to another peer who was doing a lot worse than me (Test average was a 72%, did not turn in much homework at all). This person also got an A in the class. 

 

(This ends the unbias)

 

With this in mind, I get livid. So I deduce my professor gave an extremely generous curve, however my grade seemed unmoved. So I came to the conclusion either

1)My professor just didn't curve my grade at all completely out of spite.

2)My professor graded my final unrealistically strict, giving no partial credit and 

3)My professor decided not to grade my late homework at all, even though multiple students turned in a lot of homework late.

 

 

So, was my professor wrong for this? Or did I deserve this?

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I mean, it's not really the university that's wronging you, it's the professor him or herself.  I'd complain to the department though, gathering proof might be a pain

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Wrong,he could get into legal trouble since he gave other students advantage over you and basically gave them all the answers(since it was a "practice test")

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I mean, it's not really the university that's wronging you, it's the professor him or herself.  I'd complain to the department though, gathering proof might be a pain

I have the text messages saying "Heard you posted info in the group chat, you're in trouble" as well as the messages from the girl saying she was told the practice exam was actually the final. 

Pretty sure it's against the law for me to bring in the other people's grades if I tried arguing about the unfair curve. 

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I have the text messages saying "Heard you posted info in the group chat, you're in trouble" as well as the messages from the girl saying she was told the practice exam was actually the final. 

Pretty sure it's against the law for me to bring in the other people's grades if I tried arguing about the unfair curve. 

nah I mean getting proof of other students grades/assignments to show that they did similar/equal amounts of work to you but got better grades

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Wtf kind of uni are you at? Giving out the actual final test to students is a good way to get fired very quickly.

 

Anyway yeah the grading is also bullshit, at least under anything I know. You're graded by how many questions you answered correctly, surely. Not by a subjective reasoning of the professor?

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Wrong,he could get into legal trouble since he gave other students advantage over you and basically gave them all the answers(since it was a "practice test")

LOL, this is not how anything works. This happens all the time, even with just admitting students INTO college (Affirmative action? Ever heard of it?). Stuff like this just happens, you can't change some things. In answer to Mike, unfortunately this just seems like one of those "lifes not fair" moments that sometimes occur, because I don't see a workaround and I am good at those

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LOL, this is not how anything works. This happens all the time, even with just admitting students INTO college (Affirmative action? Ever heard of it?). Stuff like this just happens, you can't change some things. In answer to Mike, unfortunately this just seems like one of those "lifes not fair" moments that sometimes occur, because I don't see a workaround and I am good at those

You must live in a fantasy.Mike has the right to go to the department and say that the teacher manipulated the test so it works in favor of other students who didn't spell the beans.For something like high school and below it does not really matter but we are talking about a university here kid.

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You must live in a fantasy.Mike has the right to go to the department and say that the teacher manipulated the test so it works in favor of other students who didn't spell the beans.For something like high school and below it does not really matter but we are talking about a university here kid.

They will not give up a professor that easily; the only circumstance I could see is if it's one of those pansy "safe space" schools that cancels exams when the American political system continues to function normally. One complaint cannot and will not change the system, ESPECIALLY at a normal university. It's a lot harder to get a decent professor then it is a high school teacher, methinks. He has the right, sure. But it won't change anything. They will do an absolute, 100% enormous load of NOTHING for a complaint of one student saying the test was manipulated. If establishments changed the rules every time one person complained, every single corporation on the planet would bow to the will of the consumer, and eventually end up bankrupt. Sorry, to say, but that is a fact of real life. I can personally guarantee that.

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They will not give up a professor that easily; the only circumstance I could see is if it's one of those pansy "safe space" schools that cancels exams when the American political system continues to function normally. One complaint cannot and will not change the system, ESPECIALLY at a normal university. It's a lot harder to get a decent professor then it is a high school teacher, methinks. He has the right, sure. But it won't change anything. They will do an absolute, 100% enormous load of NOTHING for a complaint of one student saying the test was manipulated. If establishments changed the rules every time one person complained, every single corporation on the planet would bow to the will of the consumer, and eventually end up bankrupt. Sorry, to say, but that is a fact of real life. I can personally guarantee that.

If it became known that a professor handed out exams to students (not just a single question, no the whole exam) then the guy would get fired at my university. My old prof got into trouble because he always said in his lectures "this will be very important for the exam" so you pretty much knew the subject of the questions. Handing out the questions themselves would get you fired. That's like the biggest no no in teaching, maybe just after don't bang your students

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If it became known that a professor handed out exams to students (not just a single question, no the whole exam) then the guy would get fired at my university. My old prof got into trouble because he always said in his lectures "this will be very important for the exam" so you pretty much knew the subject of the questions. Handing out the questions themselves would get you fired. That's like the biggest no no in teaching, maybe just after don't bang your students

 

Yeah this would get you sacked very quickly here, too. 

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if you feel like you've been wronged - always complain. Ive had a fair share of shit I've complained about over the course of time; universities and/or teachers arent always willing to adjust anything, but trying has paid off in quite some cases. Ive learned that most teachers dont want to admit they're wrong, but they also dont want to get trouble for these things. If your grade was affected by a bias and you can prove it (i.e if your grade has not been determined by the same curve as others, if I understood you correctly), then that is something you should be able to complain about. I generally dont understand how someone can give two different tests; they're supposed to be equal. If a teacher made a mistake like that, he's supposed to just make a new exam (and after that he can even pretend it never happened, and no one will know).

On the other hand you should check how much it really matters to you. If the difference is not crucial (like if its not the difference between passing and failing a class), I generally let things rest, and if I feel like something like that wasnt fair, then I just overly complain about it to my friends :P

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You should definitely report it. If you have proof, then your prof could get in big trouble.

Also why did the prof hand out answers to students? I mean, teachers are there to teach and improve your knowledge, not to give away answers?

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