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30 Times Students Figured Out A Way To Outsmart Their Teachers And Not Do Their Homework
Oh, the sheer hell of the assignment deadline… How much I don't miss you! I guess many of you are on the same page. Thinking back on the careless student years, nothing ruins the memories as much, but you know, it was part of that blessed and very cursed uni package.
But students out there weren’t born yesterday. They’ve been there, done that, taken one class, dropped another. So it shouldn’t come as a surprise hearing how many ingenious methods, smart tactics, and elaborate ways were implemented in uni (and school) corridors to buy yourself some extra time, that were totally unbeknownst to teachers and professors. Other creative methods were invented in order to submit an assignment that doesn’t even exist, so the list is endless.
So when Twitter user Mike Chase shared a vivid memory of handing in a paper 2 weeks late, putting a footprint on it and slipping it under the teacher’s desk, the savage bell rang to many former (and current) students out there. Below we collected some of the most savage examples, so get ready to chuckle big time! And if you have a similar story, be sure to share it in the comment section below.
Image credits: TheMikeChase
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I think it works once. If you are usually a reliable student you get the benefit of the doubt. If you always have an excuse for why your work isn't done the teacher will catch on.
It’s no secret that many kids and teens often find themselves unable to complete tasks on time, whether it be by a certain time of day or by a date on the calendar. There seem to be as many reasons for that to happen as there are excuses for it, and as you’ve seen from this post, the list is basically endless. So in order to try walking in teachers' shoes who deal with this kind of behavior on a daily basis, we spoke with Lynn How, an educator and the author of “Positive Young Minds” who specializes in supporting parents, teachers, and children navigating through mental health issues and prevention. Lynn has been a primary teacher for 20 years, so she has a lot of experience to share with us.
Teachers have cottoned on to this and some submission systems now change all the font to black on submissions.
Old-school teachers always did the maths on us (words per line x number of lines). Invisible words would be useless.
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The word count should only be an approximate anyway. A good essay will only get worse if you try to force more to it. (Though if it really is a good essay it usually won't be too short. Making it too long is more likely when you have a lot to say.)
I started using word count requirements because when I assigned a page students would give me less than half a page, if I assigned two pages they would give me one page and a sentence, etc. Now, I'm not going to downgrade someone who gives me 450/500 words. But if they give me 275/500, oh yeah, they're gonna get dinged!
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Instead of using didnt i would put stuff like ¨Did not¨ Or just use a lot of smaller words.
I've never finagled the system for a word limit. Teachers recognize a good paper and usually appreciate it regardless of brevity. If you communicate your point well, this has never been a problem.
This. It especially applies to certain disciplines. Law is a perfect example. You want to keep arguments and briefs simple, concise, and easy to read and review. When I taught, I would deduct points for unnecessary verbosity. Legal writing is already verbose enough that word use (and even order) should be as clean and precise as possible in order to eliminate any confusion in legal interpretation. Using twenty words where ten suffice is taboo in law. Thus, legal writing requires markedly different writing styles and skills than does creative writing. Also, unnecessarily verbose legal writing always gives me a migraine. 😒
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We couldn't do this when some of us were kids--mainly because we had to hand-write our papers. However, I DO recommend people do this with their resumes if they submit them digitally to a large firm that uses algorithms to process resumes. This way, your resume stays looking neat to the observer, yet all the key trigger words show up to the algorithm.
I'd just go through and change all the contractions to the two word they're combining. Easy way to add to the word count.
smart teachers would make the base in med/dark mode and expose the frauds
As I teacher, when my students ask me how long something has to be, I respond, “As long as is necessary to convey what you need to convey.” Then usually I’ll add on a caveat, “But please don’t make me read more than 5 pages.”
None of my teachers ever accepted electronic submissions. We had to print it out. Most wouldn't count each word, but I had a handful who would mark and count each individual word.
Call me a goody-two-shoes (it's okay, you can) but I never understood it when kids groaned over an assignment's word length. If anything, I got points knocked off because I always went over - even after giving my paper a severe editing! Usually, when something required 1000-1500 words, I'd invariably turn in something closer to 5000.
I used to do this on my resume to include buzz words when submitting it on online applications.
When asked how teachers deal with students trying to hand in their homework assignments late, Lynn said that it largely depends on the school's individual policy. “However,” she added, “better late than never should still apply here!” Lynn said that she would rather a student ask for an extension and give a reason rather than just being late or not handing it in at all.
While there are many reasons why students don't hand their assignments in, some kids may try to 'outsmart' a teacher. However, Lynn said that “their grades will suffer ultimately so they are really just damaging their own education. In this situation, finding the reason behind the behavior is best.”
The educator explained that “some students have difficult home lives and assignments might not be as high on their agenda in comparison to just getting through the day. In all these situations, getting parents onside is useful as well as putting in place some sort of mentor until the student is back on track.”
love it! I did the some thing once just with the first one
“I have taught children who have difficult home lives and provided them with opportunities to complete assignments in their lunchtimes or free time at school should they wish,” Lynn recounted. She said that ultimately, “If the barriers can be removed, then the issue can be reduced. You still get the odd 'the dog ate my homework' excuse (less so since a lot of it is online learning!).”
We had to do a PowerPoint presentation, some time to with in class, finish it at home. I was having some motivation issue that year and didn't have PowerPoint at home. I took the floppy I'd started at school, crinkled the dusk so it got shut in the metal slide, then acted amazed when I couldn't open my presentation. I got to give my presentation/facts with someone's sides from another period. Don't feel bad because we couldn't afford PowerPoint, especially for one assignment.
Lynn also said that once she needed to explain to her daughter's school that she did it, but the computer managed to wipe it, which is easily done. “Getting all the information from the student before making an assumption about their tardiness is important, especially when they don't have an on-board parent to advocate for them,” she concluded.
Dang, I never had teachers like this. If the teacher couldn't find the assignment they'd always claim it wasn't their misplacing, it was the students who didn't turn it in then would give a zero.
Would not have worked in my uni! Teachers would say that you had to be prepared to hand it over during this specific class, that it was your job to plan it in advance and that waiting 'till the d-day to print it was a risk you chose to take so now own up to it. And honestly I agree, it's annoying when people don't give a **** and then ask for understanding; like that's both childish and disrespectful! (of course I understand that there are moments when you do have a good reason for missing a deadline and I think teachers should take it into consideration but that's different)
Easy enough now to see if a file has been changed. Had a student submit a digital "doctor's note" with the date changed and I could prove she'd changed the date easily and she got expelled.
Why wouldn't the teacher insist that you write legibly? In high school?
Our Biology prof in College had us write summaries to the chapters and turn them in for credit (10 points each.) After about 4 chapters, she complained that the class summaries made it obvious that people were not reading the chapters and finding the important points. She then pointed everyone in my direction as I'd gotten 10 points on all of my summaries. Thanks a lot! I wasn't about to tell anyone that I just skimmed through the chapter and wasn't really reading it myself.
I thought about doing that many times in both high school and University, but I could never find an appropriate topic for a paper that would justify reassignment into classes. I don't see why it would be plagiarism though!
I once turned in a syllabus thinking it was the paper I had written. I got an email from the professor to turn in my own work. I was confused and during the next class asked the teacher what they had meant. They told me what I had done. The class had a big laugh and for the rest of the semester I would get taunts of “now don’t turn in the syllabus when you turn in this assignment.”
Note: this post originally had 47 images. It’s been shortened to the top 30 images based on user votes.
Quick note: for 95% of these "Totally tricked the teacher into thinking I turned it in, then did it later" you definitely didn't trick them. Deadlines are arbitrary and most teachers just want it done. S**t happens and as long as it's not habitual, they're mentally giving you a mulligan. One thing every single student needs to remember is that every teacher has been a student - and especially once you get to college professors, they've been students for literally decades elementary through grad school. You're not "putting one over on them" because there's like a 50/50 chance they pulled the *exact* same s**t when they were in your shoes.
This. I’m a teacher and 90% of the time I just don’t have the time or the energy to bother. But if you want to rub it in and be smug about it, you’ll get what you asked for.
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In many of these cases I feel like just doing the assignment would be easier than the "hack" ie writing a computer program that corrupts a file. And I am sure many teachers are on to these tricks, we just don't get paid enough to care or fight with you
What amazes me is that they spend all this time and effort trying to avoid having to learn about things that, in 10 or 20 years, they are going to 100% rue not knowing. If I'd paid more attention in class, I wouldn't constantly be second-guessing my knowledge of European history, historical anthropology and geography, and English lit--just a few of the things that, surprisingly enough, really matter when you reach 35 or 40 and work in executive circles. (Also, I 100% should have taken classic Latin. Everyone should.) My brain was the proverbial high-absorbancy sponge until I hit 40. Now I'm trying to teach myself German and I can't remember shït--yet I recall EVERYTHING I learned in 1 semester of French @13 and 1 year of Spanish @ 15.
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When I struggled with something and needed more time I… told them that. What’s with the need to feel like you “fooled” a teacher?
I was in high school in the late 90s, so I'm part of the generation of girls with autism spectrum disorder that weren't diagnosed. We're called "the missing girls" because doctors literally just missed the signs of our autism, because ASD manifests in a different way in girls than in boys. Sometimes when I was late on my homework because I was struggling, if I told the teachers, they'd berate me. I was constantly called lazy. They knew I was smart and I could do the work (I'm great at tests, so I can pass them even without doing the majority of the homework), so they just assumed that I wasn't "applying myself." In reality, I'd get so overwhelmed with homework, that I'd have a meltdown. I'd be sitting in the corner of my room freaking out and crying because I knew that it meant teachers were going to be mad at me. I actually graduated high school early, in 3.5 years instead of 4, because I just literally couldn't deal with the teachers. So tricking the teachers was easier sometimes.
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I had to write a paper on the brake up of church and science in uni. As my friends were having a house party, I went to my uncles caravan to get it done. My uncle turned up - he had taken early retirement and decided to get the degree he always wanted. He had the same paper title to complete. Thing was, I was doing biology, he was doing theology. There was much wine and much argument, but no writing. I knew I couldn't get an extension, but I went to apologize to my lecturer. He was really interested in what path our arguments had taken. After I told him, he said I would definitely have gotten an A for that if I'd written it. He gave me a B anyway. To be fair, guy was a legend - being dyslexic in the 90's ment low grades, he often let me top up with an oral explaination.
Ahhhh. The days of church and science. Galileo. Aquinas. The Homunculi Craze. Popes having their side-pieces secretly get abortions while demanding women who terminated pregnancies should be executed. The good old days. 😆
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I feel much older remembering that all of my papers in high school were handwritten... none of this emailing BS
One reason for the overt shift in work ethic between older and younger generations. I love millennials and GenZs for so much of what they do--they often see things that need to be changed, and they don't ask for social permission. They will be the ones who whip us into shape on climate change and population control. But their work ethics are just meh. I've sadly had to fire far too many younger people who had a lot they COULD have offered but chose not to because they came to my business with a sense of entitlement and the work ethic of a sloth. It's a bittersweet issue because they bring a lot of great energy to the work place when it comes to what they WANT to do. And I'm very tech-forward, so many people in my generation and later are incredibly hard to train in tech, where younger workers aren't. It's just that they often want to get paid lots to do little--and I blame our educational system and parents for that.
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Okay, when I forgot my homework (which is 90% of the time) I would ask to go to the bathroom. This was second grade, okay? I just waited there in the stalls for about 5 minutes. When I came back, the teacher was always past the homework check and teaching the class. I may have missed out on a LOT of knowledge, but still-
You learned a valuable lesson, tho. When your teacher is inept, play up to the inanity. 😆
Load More Replies... This is not "outsmarting" a teacher, it's reinforcing your own stupidity because the assignments are made so you learn something. If you don't do the work, you stay ignorant. Congrats on your own stupidity.
I agree--albeit in a gentler way. I did horribly in school (most of it was due to environmental/familial stressors and demands, going to 16 different schools in 12 years, and being severely ADHD). So bad that, even though I got it together and made straight As my senior year, I still only graduated with a 2.7 GPA. Over the years, a very valuable lesson became evident to me: once you fall behind, catching up is almost impossible. So I always told my kids that education was like an upside down pyramid---every additional layer (aka anything you learn) relies upon a solid foundation--because it all builds on itself. If you fall behind in math, it's really difficult to be good at math later on...and, eventually, it impacts other subjects as well. Really hard to keep an inverted pyramid upright and straight with a poorly built foundation. Each layer becomes broader and heavier, and it all relies on the lower layers being strong and sound. Wish someone had told ME.
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The issue with these is when stuff like that legitimately happens, teachers are sceptical. Like I submitted an assignment, it fell behind the folder when it went in the slot. I had to argue with my prof and finally get the dean involved to overturn the mark i had received. I had to show that it was written before the due date. I had to find the receipt from the on campus printer. They had to remove cl the folders to see it there and then they needed to verify that the ink date stamp on it matched the one used that day (my uni changed the colours everyday and I submitted my assignment a day early so it was different than all the other assignments handed in last minute). Like i had to jump through so many hoops... because some people are fundamentally dishonest.
Thinking you're tricking people, and then being smug, is gross behavior. A lot of people just don't have the time, or energy, to fight you on it. It's also frustrating from a person who worked my ass off despite awful situations to know how many people *consistently* get free passes. Especially when I know a lot of teachers would work with you if you were struggling, or just screwed up once. A handful of mistakes, needing a pass, is much different than scamming entire classes. This whole thing just seems sad.
Agree! I'm 100% against rewarding bad behavior. --Reinforce good behavior, extinguish bad behavior!-- Because this kind of behavior, if kids get away with it, gets reinforced and then carries into adulthood. It becomes problematic for EVERYONE. I had a newly-hired associate attorney a few years ago who missed a few deadlines, was often late, and did shoddy work in his first 3 weeks with us. He also questioned EVERYTHING we did (as if some putz who went to Regent University knows more than all the other highly skilled and experienced "super" attorneys at a top-rated firm). And he ALWAYS had excuses when he failed to do right. After the third week, I told him to clear his office and never return. Because all the time, effort, and money we put into vetting, hiring, training, and molding him to be a decent attorney was wasted--just because some entitled twat was raised to think all that shït was okay.
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A couple of them seem fair enough, like the kid who, without lying or disrupting class, put his incomplete math assignment on his desk while the teacher walked the rows to see who had done it. But most of them are not respectable.
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Junior year of high school we had a semester long English project that we were supposed to work on and turn in at the end of the semester. I only had about half my work done and the day before the assignment was due, someone broke into my car. I told my teacher they had stolen my backpack, which had the whole project in it. She gave me an A for the assignment... (She was also a terrible teacher so there's that...)
These seem mostly about not doing te work rather than outsmarting the teacher. I got one. Uni circuits class. Old prof with a thick accent and Old hand written notes. I sat through 2 lectures and I came away more confused then I went it. I started just went to the library, read the book, and did the assignment during the lecture. Took me half the time as class and aced the mid term. When I showed up 9 weeks later for the final he asked who I was (he knew and took it personally). I proceeded to ace the final. I thought I outsmarted the prof until he gave me a C-. So much for the focus being on learning the material rather then paying homage to ego.
It amazes me how some college professors overestimate their own value. I went to college on my GI Bill & was a newly single mother of 3 young kids with no family + an ex who disappeared on us. I got high 90s in 2 courses one semester but missed several lectures in each bc my kids got sick. TWO professors tried to drop my finals 1 whole grade, despite me getting a 98 w/ one and a 99 w/ the other. I argued that the absences didn't effect me bc I had the textbook. But they wouldn't budge, so I had to appeal to the administration & argue, in front of a panel, why I disagreed. I told them, "If it were true that any one professor is so singularly integral to the comprehension of course material, textbooks wouldn't exist--and the moment that educator left the academic environment, learning would cease altogether. Educators are facilitators, NOT GOD. They are there to assist in comprehension of material, not to assign limitations on how learning must occur." The egos. Got my As tho!
Load More Replies... 7th grade. Speech due that I knew NOTHING about... Panick stricken and not knowing WTF to do the teacher calls out we will be going in Reverse Alphabetical order this time. My last name starts with D. Speech sucked, dripping sweat, but I fasho pounded out a speech while everyone was doin theirs.
Not so much got passed a teacher but got past my parents... Back in the 80s, schools started to print out report cards instead of using a "report card". So back then I was a little wild and hated school. My freshman year of high school I took computer lit, think ms dos basically, and got the brilliant idea I could do the same thing! So long story short, as long as I really passed the classes and didn't get my absences in the red zone, I could print out my very own report card. Parents were non the wiser. I did this all thru high school. Now I wish I'd have paid attn in math and science.... Oh I never turned in a science project either. So basically just bs'd my way thru... Teachers loved me tho...
It's all well and good until you apply to good schools like your parents expect you to (bc they really think you got good grades) and every one rejects you. Eventually, the time comes to sow. Lol. And you're lucky if your college counselor doesn't mention your grades a hundred times in front of your parents. 😆
Load More Replies... I am horribly bad at math. In algebra, we graded our own homework and the teacher walked through every single problem on the board. I’d come into the class with a blank sheet of paper and leave with an A. I had 90’s on all my homework but 30s on tests. There’s no way he didn’t know; I think he just accepted that I was bad at math and let me get away with it because I was a model student in every other way.
That last sentence. If you are a good kid, it's a lot easier to overlook some things.
Load More Replies... These work because the teachers actually lose or forget assignments sometimes. In high school I once turned in an essay but didn't get it back with the others. I asked the teacher, he looked me in the eye and said very confidently "B". To this day I don't know if he remembered it was a B or made a deal with me to get a free B because he had lost it. Either way, was fine with me.
We were allowed to use Wikipedia as a source for basic, non-controversial topics in our history class. When I had to write a longer report, I needed a source for something that I knew off the top of my head but my knowledge came from multiple books and I didn't want to go through all of them again. So I wrote a Wikipedia article myself and used that as a source.
btw, I do undergrad assignments for students on the side at a small fee. You can HMU through whatsapp at +254710749540 if you may need assistance with your work or are too busy to complete your homework
This was fun reading, until I got to think. Who was fooled? If the assignment were never made, maybe the student missed out on something important to her or his future.
Warning: very long story ahead. I did something like this, once. I had this one big essay assignment, my senior year in high school. And I'd worked hard on it. But on the day it was due, I was standing at my locker, before morning bell, when I realized, "Oh shít biscuits! I completely forgot to type my final draft!" (Hello again, unmedicated ADHD!) All I had was my hand-written first draft. I couldn't use that. The teacher had already seen it. The final copy HAD to be typed. We had already been told there would be absolutely no late papers accepted, no exceptions. This paper was a HUGE part of my grade. And I was already struggling, because ADHD (& possible Autism as well), but it was 1997, &, as someone else already said, that stuff wasn't understood then, much less accepted as the mental disorders they really were, or accommodated in any way. I couldn't tell my teacher I got so overwhelmed by all my other homework, & all my struggles, that I forgot to do it. /1
They wouldn't accept that as a valid reason, any more than they would accept a late paper. What could I do?? Then I realized... If I went home sick, before that class, I couldn't PHYSICALLY be there, to turn it in. They'd HAVE to allow me to turn it in, the next day I came back. I mean, they couldn't penalize me for being SICK. So, halfway through my first class of the day, I got up and quickly walked to the bathroom (school had kind of an odd layout, and this classroom was also a shared route to other classrooms, so there was a bathroom right there, and we didn't have to ask to go, if the class was doing quiet work). Once inside, I waited a few minutes, and then actually stuck my finger down my throat, and made myself gag a couple times (sorry TMI lol), so my eyes would be all watery, and I'd be all sniffly and out of breath. So I'd look authentic. Then I came back out and told my teacher I'd just thrown up, and asked to go to the office. My plan worked like a charm. /2
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When I was in the 6th grade I had been assigned this project basically I had to build a pyramid with two floors on the inside and three traps in it is completely forgot about it until I was laying down to go to bed the night before it was do I jumped out of bed like oh shoot i need to do something so I ran out into my garage grabbed a cardboard box some straws and some toothpicks literally slapped something together in less than 5 minutes and turned it in got in a on the project and got in a+ when other kids in my class spent the whole month working on theirs and failed miserably
I had some cool teachers I could just ask for more time, or just be completely honest with about not doing it. Then I had some that I'd have to trick because they were so evil of you didn't go above and beyond. My absolute most hated teachers were the ones that you would ask for help on something and they'd just tell you to read the question again. SMH. I will never forget their laziness or lack of care.
My math teacher never looks at the answers for our homework, the whole 7th and 8th grade know this, and I am the best at math in my class, and I dont even put the answers
What is so sad is that these people think that they are so "brilliant" but what they did was sell their integrity for nothing. You will never get it back and you will always think that you are "smarter" than other people because you cheated and you treated people like dirt. You will never overcome that attitude and it will mark you all your life. Your integrity is the ONLY thing you can destroy and it will always define you as a person.
Couple of times I faked my way into not taking a surprise test (usually math or physics, not my strong points). I used to be late for classes often, just because I overslept. Therefore I would miss initial checking of the attendance list but be there by the time surprise quiz would start. If I felt like I had a strong zero coming my way, I'd fake working on my answers with the rest of the class, then not bring my paper to the teachers desk. In classes of 30 or more students that would go unnoticed. Then, at the end of the class, when I was supposed to go to teacher again to correct my attendance, I'd just leave and later claim that I wasn't in that day and didn't take the quiz at all. In European school, where perfect attendance isn't mandatory that wouldn't raise an eyebrow at all.
My elder daughter figured out how skip her math homework on the school computer in 3rd grade. We didn't even have one yet
My favorite story was my husband who created a video showing a program working despite it not actually working. The program instead would boot up the video of the correct process. The TA who marked it was fooled. The professor wasn't but didn't remove any marks as it was a genius way of salvaging the project. He ended up writing him a letter of recommendation that helped him get his first programming job.
I once had a student traveling abroad for a sports tournament. 14 students submitted an important assignment, on time, during the trip. One did not. He offered the following excuse. "I can't turn in my homework project because the team has no wifi!" Remember, his 14 teammates all submitted! But even better, he sent the excuse by email! And best of all, the class policy was that if he simply asked for an extension, I'd take off a couple of points and give him extra time! Some people are simply too dumb to be good liars!
I think it was in 7th grade, we had to do a group project that was like a news paper, and glue the articles to a tri-fold board. For my article I couldn't (or didn't) find enough information to meet the required length, so I just copied and pasted my paragraph. The rest of the group didn't read everyone's articles. We just glued them on to the board. Clearly the teacher didn't read it either, as our group got an A!
I think it would have been beneficial for @themikechase to actually do their homework. With a grasp on grammar that poor you can't fool anyone.
Had a history paper due in high school. Wrote like the ending two pages with it starting "in conclusion blah blah (history subject jargon) is why blah blah happened. It had my name at the top of the two pages because we were told to do that. Stapled some blank pages to the top an ripped them off so the edges were still under the staple. When we passed up all the papers the teacher just put them in a pile. Teacher says most of my report was missing and someone must have messed w it (I was sorta bullied a lot in school) so he gave me a b- for at least getting a few pages in an for the sad look of being messed with.
How long have you been obliged to turn in essays/papers on digital media (email, program, disk,...) and not on paper any more ? I have the feeling it arrived much later in Europe.
For my post-graduate in the UK we were required to submit our essays to the school secretary via a secure file-sharing platform.I think my dissertation was the only item of work that I actually submitted in printed form with a fancy binder and everything.
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Had to take french in school and I hated it but I was all right at it. Teacher liked to go over the workbook homework as a class. Would go to the washroom at the start of class, come back halfway through the homework checkup and if I was called on either supply the answer or claim I missed that one. Never got into trouble. But in the sixth grade we still had to do spelling homework and I resented that, thought I was too old/too advanced for it and never did the homework and there was no issue as I could say the answer when called on. But then the teacher found out towards the end of the year and said I needed to complete the entire workbook or I would get a zero. By the end of the week. That was hell
so a few years ago our math teacher made us do this math program. we would have to submit a screenshot of proof of how many minutes we did since it tracked our time. i hated the program so i just did a few minutes, took a screenshot then edited it to make it look like i did the required minutes. teacher never caught on and we did that throughout the whole year, so i got out of math hw for an entire year
My best friend and I took this class in college where we had to order books about the mythology of obscure tribes from the Northwest Coast of America and Canada. This was before the internet had really taken off and the libraries up in British Colombia told us it would take 12 weeks to process our order, basically the entire length of the quarter. There were like, 25 different tribes to choose from and the professor didn't seem to know what was going on whatsoever. So, we made up fables about "The Crow and the Wolf" or whatever and wrote papers, turned in fake bibliographies, and participated in discussion panels about the mythologies of our tribes. It was a graduate level class but we were undergrad students taking it as an elective. I have no idea what everyone else did but we literally invented the entire thing. Got a B.
Back in the early 90's when I was in grad school we had a paper due, but I hadn't done it. Luckily, a little while back I had asked the professor if I could fax it to him instead of driving to campus and he said yes. So I made a cover sheet and faxed that. I timed how long the fax took. Then I wrote the first part of the paper and faxed the coversheet and the first two or three paragraphs, and started to fax it to him. I turned off the fax modem a few seconds after the cover sheet would have started. Then I took the weekend to write the paper, printed it out, and brought it with me to class. I asked the professor if he had received it, and he said something when wrong and he only got the very start of it. I apologized and handed him the printed copy. I don't remember what I got, but it was full credit!
Quick note: for 95% of these "Totally tricked the teacher into thinking I turned it in, then did it later" you definitely didn't trick them. Deadlines are arbitrary and most teachers just want it done. S**t happens and as long as it's not habitual, they're mentally giving you a mulligan. One thing every single student needs to remember is that every teacher has been a student - and especially once you get to college professors, they've been students for literally decades elementary through grad school. You're not "putting one over on them" because there's like a 50/50 chance they pulled the *exact* same s**t when they were in your shoes.
This. I’m a teacher and 90% of the time I just don’t have the time or the energy to bother. But if you want to rub it in and be smug about it, you’ll get what you asked for.
Load More Replies... In many of these cases I feel like just doing the assignment would be easier than the "hack" ie writing a computer program that corrupts a file. And I am sure many teachers are on to these tricks, we just don't get paid enough to care or fight with you
What amazes me is that they spend all this time and effort trying to avoid having to learn about things that, in 10 or 20 years, they are going to 100% rue not knowing. If I'd paid more attention in class, I wouldn't constantly be second-guessing my knowledge of European history, historical anthropology and geography, and English lit--just a few of the things that, surprisingly enough, really matter when you reach 35 or 40 and work in executive circles. (Also, I 100% should have taken classic Latin. Everyone should.) My brain was the proverbial high-absorbancy sponge until I hit 40. Now I'm trying to teach myself German and I can't remember shït--yet I recall EVERYTHING I learned in 1 semester of French @13 and 1 year of Spanish @ 15.
Load More Replies... When I struggled with something and needed more time I… told them that. What’s with the need to feel like you “fooled” a teacher?
I was in high school in the late 90s, so I'm part of the generation of girls with autism spectrum disorder that weren't diagnosed. We're called "the missing girls" because doctors literally just missed the signs of our autism, because ASD manifests in a different way in girls than in boys. Sometimes when I was late on my homework because I was struggling, if I told the teachers, they'd berate me. I was constantly called lazy. They knew I was smart and I could do the work (I'm great at tests, so I can pass them even without doing the majority of the homework), so they just assumed that I wasn't "applying myself." In reality, I'd get so overwhelmed with homework, that I'd have a meltdown. I'd be sitting in the corner of my room freaking out and crying because I knew that it meant teachers were going to be mad at me. I actually graduated high school early, in 3.5 years instead of 4, because I just literally couldn't deal with the teachers. So tricking the teachers was easier sometimes.
Load More Replies... I had to write a paper on the brake up of church and science in uni. As my friends were having a house party, I went to my uncles caravan to get it done. My uncle turned up - he had taken early retirement and decided to get the degree he always wanted. He had the same paper title to complete. Thing was, I was doing biology, he was doing theology. There was much wine and much argument, but no writing. I knew I couldn't get an extension, but I went to apologize to my lecturer. He was really interested in what path our arguments had taken. After I told him, he said I would definitely have gotten an A for that if I'd written it. He gave me a B anyway. To be fair, guy was a legend - being dyslexic in the 90's ment low grades, he often let me top up with an oral explaination.
Ahhhh. The days of church and science. Galileo. Aquinas. The Homunculi Craze. Popes having their side-pieces secretly get abortions while demanding women who terminated pregnancies should be executed. The good old days. 😆
Load More Replies... I feel much older remembering that all of my papers in high school were handwritten... none of this emailing BS
One reason for the overt shift in work ethic between older and younger generations. I love millennials and GenZs for so much of what they do--they often see things that need to be changed, and they don't ask for social permission. They will be the ones who whip us into shape on climate change and population control. But their work ethics are just meh. I've sadly had to fire far too many younger people who had a lot they COULD have offered but chose not to because they came to my business with a sense of entitlement and the work ethic of a sloth. It's a bittersweet issue because they bring a lot of great energy to the work place when it comes to what they WANT to do. And I'm very tech-forward, so many people in my generation and later are incredibly hard to train in tech, where younger workers aren't. It's just that they often want to get paid lots to do little--and I blame our educational system and parents for that.
Load More Replies... Okay, when I forgot my homework (which is 90% of the time) I would ask to go to the bathroom. This was second grade, okay? I just waited there in the stalls for about 5 minutes. When I came back, the teacher was always past the homework check and teaching the class. I may have missed out on a LOT of knowledge, but still-
You learned a valuable lesson, tho. When your teacher is inept, play up to the inanity. 😆
Load More Replies... This is not "outsmarting" a teacher, it's reinforcing your own stupidity because the assignments are made so you learn something. If you don't do the work, you stay ignorant. Congrats on your own stupidity.
I agree--albeit in a gentler way. I did horribly in school (most of it was due to environmental/familial stressors and demands, going to 16 different schools in 12 years, and being severely ADHD). So bad that, even though I got it together and made straight As my senior year, I still only graduated with a 2.7 GPA. Over the years, a very valuable lesson became evident to me: once you fall behind, catching up is almost impossible. So I always told my kids that education was like an upside down pyramid---every additional layer (aka anything you learn) relies upon a solid foundation--because it all builds on itself. If you fall behind in math, it's really difficult to be good at math later on...and, eventually, it impacts other subjects as well. Really hard to keep an inverted pyramid upright and straight with a poorly built foundation. Each layer becomes broader and heavier, and it all relies on the lower layers being strong and sound. Wish someone had told ME.
Load More Replies... The issue with these is when stuff like that legitimately happens, teachers are sceptical. Like I submitted an assignment, it fell behind the folder when it went in the slot. I had to argue with my prof and finally get the dean involved to overturn the mark i had received. I had to show that it was written before the due date. I had to find the receipt from the on campus printer. They had to remove cl the folders to see it there and then they needed to verify that the ink date stamp on it matched the one used that day (my uni changed the colours everyday and I submitted my assignment a day early so it was different than all the other assignments handed in last minute). Like i had to jump through so many hoops... because some people are fundamentally dishonest.
Thinking you're tricking people, and then being smug, is gross behavior. A lot of people just don't have the time, or energy, to fight you on it. It's also frustrating from a person who worked my ass off despite awful situations to know how many people *consistently* get free passes. Especially when I know a lot of teachers would work with you if you were struggling, or just screwed up once. A handful of mistakes, needing a pass, is much different than scamming entire classes. This whole thing just seems sad.
Agree! I'm 100% against rewarding bad behavior. --Reinforce good behavior, extinguish bad behavior!-- Because this kind of behavior, if kids get away with it, gets reinforced and then carries into adulthood. It becomes problematic for EVERYONE. I had a newly-hired associate attorney a few years ago who missed a few deadlines, was often late, and did shoddy work in his first 3 weeks with us. He also questioned EVERYTHING we did (as if some putz who went to Regent University knows more than all the other highly skilled and experienced "super" attorneys at a top-rated firm). And he ALWAYS had excuses when he failed to do right. After the third week, I told him to clear his office and never return. Because all the time, effort, and money we put into vetting, hiring, training, and molding him to be a decent attorney was wasted--just because some entitled twat was raised to think all that shït was okay.
Load More Replies... A couple of them seem fair enough, like the kid who, without lying or disrupting class, put his incomplete math assignment on his desk while the teacher walked the rows to see who had done it. But most of them are not respectable.
Load More Replies... Junior year of high school we had a semester long English project that we were supposed to work on and turn in at the end of the semester. I only had about half my work done and the day before the assignment was due, someone broke into my car. I told my teacher they had stolen my backpack, which had the whole project in it. She gave me an A for the assignment... (She was also a terrible teacher so there's that...)
These seem mostly about not doing te work rather than outsmarting the teacher. I got one. Uni circuits class. Old prof with a thick accent and Old hand written notes. I sat through 2 lectures and I came away more confused then I went it. I started just went to the library, read the book, and did the assignment during the lecture. Took me half the time as class and aced the mid term. When I showed up 9 weeks later for the final he asked who I was (he knew and took it personally). I proceeded to ace the final. I thought I outsmarted the prof until he gave me a C-. So much for the focus being on learning the material rather then paying homage to ego.
It amazes me how some college professors overestimate their own value. I went to college on my GI Bill & was a newly single mother of 3 young kids with no family + an ex who disappeared on us. I got high 90s in 2 courses one semester but missed several lectures in each bc my kids got sick. TWO professors tried to drop my finals 1 whole grade, despite me getting a 98 w/ one and a 99 w/ the other. I argued that the absences didn't effect me bc I had the textbook. But they wouldn't budge, so I had to appeal to the administration & argue, in front of a panel, why I disagreed. I told them, "If it were true that any one professor is so singularly integral to the comprehension of course material, textbooks wouldn't exist--and the moment that educator left the academic environment, learning would cease altogether. Educators are facilitators, NOT GOD. They are there to assist in comprehension of material, not to assign limitations on how learning must occur." The egos. Got my As tho!
Load More Replies... 7th grade. Speech due that I knew NOTHING about... Panick stricken and not knowing WTF to do the teacher calls out we will be going in Reverse Alphabetical order this time. My last name starts with D. Speech sucked, dripping sweat, but I fasho pounded out a speech while everyone was doin theirs.
Not so much got passed a teacher but got past my parents... Back in the 80s, schools started to print out report cards instead of using a "report card". So back then I was a little wild and hated school. My freshman year of high school I took computer lit, think ms dos basically, and got the brilliant idea I could do the same thing! So long story short, as long as I really passed the classes and didn't get my absences in the red zone, I could print out my very own report card. Parents were non the wiser. I did this all thru high school. Now I wish I'd have paid attn in math and science.... Oh I never turned in a science project either. So basically just bs'd my way thru... Teachers loved me tho...
It's all well and good until you apply to good schools like your parents expect you to (bc they really think you got good grades) and every one rejects you. Eventually, the time comes to sow. Lol. And you're lucky if your college counselor doesn't mention your grades a hundred times in front of your parents. 😆
Load More Replies... I am horribly bad at math. In algebra, we graded our own homework and the teacher walked through every single problem on the board. I’d come into the class with a blank sheet of paper and leave with an A. I had 90’s on all my homework but 30s on tests. There’s no way he didn’t know; I think he just accepted that I was bad at math and let me get away with it because I was a model student in every other way.
That last sentence. If you are a good kid, it's a lot easier to overlook some things.
Load More Replies... These work because the teachers actually lose or forget assignments sometimes. In high school I once turned in an essay but didn't get it back with the others. I asked the teacher, he looked me in the eye and said very confidently "B". To this day I don't know if he remembered it was a B or made a deal with me to get a free B because he had lost it. Either way, was fine with me.
We were allowed to use Wikipedia as a source for basic, non-controversial topics in our history class. When I had to write a longer report, I needed a source for something that I knew off the top of my head but my knowledge came from multiple books and I didn't want to go through all of them again. So I wrote a Wikipedia article myself and used that as a source.
btw, I do undergrad assignments for students on the side at a small fee. You can HMU through whatsapp at +254710749540 if you may need assistance with your work or are too busy to complete your homework
This was fun reading, until I got to think. Who was fooled? If the assignment were never made, maybe the student missed out on something important to her or his future.
Warning: very long story ahead. I did something like this, once. I had this one big essay assignment, my senior year in high school. And I'd worked hard on it. But on the day it was due, I was standing at my locker, before morning bell, when I realized, "Oh shít biscuits! I completely forgot to type my final draft!" (Hello again, unmedicated ADHD!) All I had was my hand-written first draft. I couldn't use that. The teacher had already seen it. The final copy HAD to be typed. We had already been told there would be absolutely no late papers accepted, no exceptions. This paper was a HUGE part of my grade. And I was already struggling, because ADHD (& possible Autism as well), but it was 1997, &, as someone else already said, that stuff wasn't understood then, much less accepted as the mental disorders they really were, or accommodated in any way. I couldn't tell my teacher I got so overwhelmed by all my other homework, & all my struggles, that I forgot to do it. /1
They wouldn't accept that as a valid reason, any more than they would accept a late paper. What could I do?? Then I realized... If I went home sick, before that class, I couldn't PHYSICALLY be there, to turn it in. They'd HAVE to allow me to turn it in, the next day I came back. I mean, they couldn't penalize me for being SICK. So, halfway through my first class of the day, I got up and quickly walked to the bathroom (school had kind of an odd layout, and this classroom was also a shared route to other classrooms, so there was a bathroom right there, and we didn't have to ask to go, if the class was doing quiet work). Once inside, I waited a few minutes, and then actually stuck my finger down my throat, and made myself gag a couple times (sorry TMI lol), so my eyes would be all watery, and I'd be all sniffly and out of breath. So I'd look authentic. Then I came back out and told my teacher I'd just thrown up, and asked to go to the office. My plan worked like a charm. /2
Load More Replies... When I was in the 6th grade I had been assigned this project basically I had to build a pyramid with two floors on the inside and three traps in it is completely forgot about it until I was laying down to go to bed the night before it was do I jumped out of bed like oh shoot i need to do something so I ran out into my garage grabbed a cardboard box some straws and some toothpicks literally slapped something together in less than 5 minutes and turned it in got in a on the project and got in a+ when other kids in my class spent the whole month working on theirs and failed miserably
I had some cool teachers I could just ask for more time, or just be completely honest with about not doing it. Then I had some that I'd have to trick because they were so evil of you didn't go above and beyond. My absolute most hated teachers were the ones that you would ask for help on something and they'd just tell you to read the question again. SMH. I will never forget their laziness or lack of care.
My math teacher never looks at the answers for our homework, the whole 7th and 8th grade know this, and I am the best at math in my class, and I dont even put the answers
What is so sad is that these people think that they are so "brilliant" but what they did was sell their integrity for nothing. You will never get it back and you will always think that you are "smarter" than other people because you cheated and you treated people like dirt. You will never overcome that attitude and it will mark you all your life. Your integrity is the ONLY thing you can destroy and it will always define you as a person.
Couple of times I faked my way into not taking a surprise test (usually math or physics, not my strong points). I used to be late for classes often, just because I overslept. Therefore I would miss initial checking of the attendance list but be there by the time surprise quiz would start. If I felt like I had a strong zero coming my way, I'd fake working on my answers with the rest of the class, then not bring my paper to the teachers desk. In classes of 30 or more students that would go unnoticed. Then, at the end of the class, when I was supposed to go to teacher again to correct my attendance, I'd just leave and later claim that I wasn't in that day and didn't take the quiz at all. In European school, where perfect attendance isn't mandatory that wouldn't raise an eyebrow at all.
My elder daughter figured out how skip her math homework on the school computer in 3rd grade. We didn't even have one yet
My favorite story was my husband who created a video showing a program working despite it not actually working. The program instead would boot up the video of the correct process. The TA who marked it was fooled. The professor wasn't but didn't remove any marks as it was a genius way of salvaging the project. He ended up writing him a letter of recommendation that helped him get his first programming job.
I once had a student traveling abroad for a sports tournament. 14 students submitted an important assignment, on time, during the trip. One did not. He offered the following excuse. "I can't turn in my homework project because the team has no wifi!" Remember, his 14 teammates all submitted! But even better, he sent the excuse by email! And best of all, the class policy was that if he simply asked for an extension, I'd take off a couple of points and give him extra time! Some people are simply too dumb to be good liars!
I think it was in 7th grade, we had to do a group project that was like a news paper, and glue the articles to a tri-fold board. For my article I couldn't (or didn't) find enough information to meet the required length, so I just copied and pasted my paragraph. The rest of the group didn't read everyone's articles. We just glued them on to the board. Clearly the teacher didn't read it either, as our group got an A!
I think it would have been beneficial for @themikechase to actually do their homework. With a grasp on grammar that poor you can't fool anyone.
Had a history paper due in high school. Wrote like the ending two pages with it starting "in conclusion blah blah (history subject jargon) is why blah blah happened. It had my name at the top of the two pages because we were told to do that. Stapled some blank pages to the top an ripped them off so the edges were still under the staple. When we passed up all the papers the teacher just put them in a pile. Teacher says most of my report was missing and someone must have messed w it (I was sorta bullied a lot in school) so he gave me a b- for at least getting a few pages in an for the sad look of being messed with.
How long have you been obliged to turn in essays/papers on digital media (email, program, disk,...) and not on paper any more ? I have the feeling it arrived much later in Europe.
For my post-graduate in the UK we were required to submit our essays to the school secretary via a secure file-sharing platform.I think my dissertation was the only item of work that I actually submitted in printed form with a fancy binder and everything.
Load More Replies... Had to take french in school and I hated it but I was all right at it. Teacher liked to go over the workbook homework as a class. Would go to the washroom at the start of class, come back halfway through the homework checkup and if I was called on either supply the answer or claim I missed that one. Never got into trouble. But in the sixth grade we still had to do spelling homework and I resented that, thought I was too old/too advanced for it and never did the homework and there was no issue as I could say the answer when called on. But then the teacher found out towards the end of the year and said I needed to complete the entire workbook or I would get a zero. By the end of the week. That was hell
so a few years ago our math teacher made us do this math program. we would have to submit a screenshot of proof of how many minutes we did since it tracked our time. i hated the program so i just did a few minutes, took a screenshot then edited it to make it look like i did the required minutes. teacher never caught on and we did that throughout the whole year, so i got out of math hw for an entire year
My best friend and I took this class in college where we had to order books about the mythology of obscure tribes from the Northwest Coast of America and Canada. This was before the internet had really taken off and the libraries up in British Colombia told us it would take 12 weeks to process our order, basically the entire length of the quarter. There were like, 25 different tribes to choose from and the professor didn't seem to know what was going on whatsoever. So, we made up fables about "The Crow and the Wolf" or whatever and wrote papers, turned in fake bibliographies, and participated in discussion panels about the mythologies of our tribes. It was a graduate level class but we were undergrad students taking it as an elective. I have no idea what everyone else did but we literally invented the entire thing. Got a B.
Back in the early 90's when I was in grad school we had a paper due, but I hadn't done it. Luckily, a little while back I had asked the professor if I could fax it to him instead of driving to campus and he said yes. So I made a cover sheet and faxed that. I timed how long the fax took. Then I wrote the first part of the paper and faxed the coversheet and the first two or three paragraphs, and started to fax it to him. I turned off the fax modem a few seconds after the cover sheet would have started. Then I took the weekend to write the paper, printed it out, and brought it with me to class. I asked the professor if he had received it, and he said something when wrong and he only got the very start of it. I apologized and handed him the printed copy. I don't remember what I got, but it was full credit!
