Students Who Lost Their Temper With A Teacher Share What Set Them Off
School: a magical place that pushes you to grow and be the best version of yourself through education and social interaction. Along for the ride on your academic journey are—you guessed it—the educators. We’ve heard of teachers who are inspirational, teachers who are true role models, and teachers who “none of this would be possible” without. Then, there are the horror stories of some teachers and how they’ve belittled, embarrassed, or even downright disrespected the very students they’re supposed to be encouraging.
As a know-nothing kid, you’re told to sit quietly and do as you’re told because the teacher knows best. However, not everyone is as willing to let that kind of behavior slide, teacher or not. These students describe the things their teachers did or said that pushed them beyond their limits.
Don’t forget to check the comment section below the article for more interesting stories!
#1 Ever Heard Of Email?
A girl flipped out on my economics professor because she kept canceling class without sending out emails. The girl only had that class on Fridays and drove an hour to get there. She’d get caught in traffic, just to see a note next to the classroom saying, “canceled.”
#2 A Passive Aggressive “I Told You So”
A friend of mine wanted to go to a certain out-of-state university that was somewhat tough to get into. The counselor told him not to waste his time as he would never get in. This made him mad so he went to the principal, who told him to trust the counselor as that was her job.
He applied anyways, got accepted, and taped two copies of the acceptance letter to both of their doors. He couldn’t afford to go anyway, but he was trying to prove a point.
#3 Something That Doesn’t Need To Be Taught
My mother and father passed away when I was in my final year of school. I was off school for a while around the time of the second funeral. When I returned to school, my tutor decided it was her job to tell the class what had just happened in my life, right there in front of everyone, instead of letting me do it on my own terms.
To say I lost my temper would be an understatement.
#4 Where’s The Logic In That?
I flipped out on a professor who “lost” my assignment records.
Professor: “You didn’t do them. I’m looking at your grades right now and they’re zeros across the board. That’s why you have a ‘D’ in this class right now.:
Me: “Look, I have the papers you’ve graded right here. They aren’t good, but they are NOT zeros.”
It was over the phone, but eventually, I read through his comments on my papers while he was trying to argue with me.
That’s when he was like, “Okay… That doesn’t sound made up… Scan your papers and email them in.”
I went from a ‘D’ to a ‘B.’
#5 Guess They Don’t Teach Compassion
One of my best friends in high school had died in a car accident, and a couple of days later, my friends and I told my teacher we would not be able to make it to class because of the viewing. She then proceeded to tell us that we needed to plan our days better and that what we were doing was irresponsible of us. I’ve never felt so much rage. Screw you, Mrs. Weaver.
#6 Got It Out For The Whole Family
My I.T. teacher wanted to inspect my work. They were spreadsheets or a Word document or something. Anyway, she accidentally deleted the file. I was so upset and made sure to keep rubbing it into her that she just deleted my work. She started to shout at me, telling me that I should have saved more frequently. I shouted back, telling her that wasn’t the issue… She outright deleted the file. It got pretty heated. My parents were called. We were yelling at each other for a good couple of minutes to the point where we were both in tears. I was about 14 at the time. She should have known better.
A few years later, my sister had her when she went to that school and that same teacher berated her.
#7 Meeting On Common Ground
I know a guy who once lost it in a lesson and threw a chair at the teacher. Essentially, the discussion had turned into an argument that held up the rest of the lesson. The guy was basically being awkward and pedantic, not letting it go, getting unduly steamed up and not realizing that everyone was getting pretty tired. The teacher made some snide remark and the guy flipped, threw a chair and walked out. He waited outside to cool off, and afterward, the teacher went outside as well. He said something to the effect of: “I think we both ought to apologize for what just happened.”
And so they did. Then all was well.
#8 Hopefully, The Angry Letter Was 16 Pages, Too
When I was in eighth grade, my science teacher decided the day before the last test of the year to give us an extra 16 pages of new material to learn by ourselves that would appear in the test. Needless to say, everyone lost it and started complaining. I wrote her an angry letter. I was later forced either to apologize or they would tell my parents. I apologized because it may have been a little inappropriate and by the end of the year, she was fired after her first year in the school. She also thought it was a good idea to bring her dogs to part of the lessons in the science lab when there are two kids who were allergic to dogs.
#9 Bring It On, Teach
I did a math test where you could only mark your answer on the paper, and any calculations you needed to make were to be done on another paper. Long story short, my teacher lost my calculations paper and wouldn’t admit it. He said I didn’t hand it over, that I cheated and some other stuff… So I went to the school supervisor and asked to take the test again. She let me.
My teacher asked to look while I did the test. He made another test that was way harder than the first. I aced it, right in front of him. He hated my guts for the rest of high school and I couldn’t care less.
#10 “F” Is For Farewell
I once flipped out on my German teacher (I’m German myself). She obviously didn’t like me and her grading was biased. This one time, she gave me an F on a poetry interpretation. I always got an A for grammar, because she had to give me credit where my work is quantifiably good. But for all the other categories where she could base her grading on her subjective opinion, I would get really bad marks.
After handing the papers back out to the students, she did some debriefing about the whole thing, comparing what everyone wrote. She told the whole class how good my thoughts on the poem were and she wanted me to read out loud what I wrote. I just said, “You gave me an F,” then I stood up and left.
#11 Doctor’s Note, Shmocters Note
I had a bout of stomach flu which was so intense that it damaged my intestines. As a result, my body couldn’t process certain foods for a while. This caused me severe pain. I mainly had cramps that were so bad I couldn’t do anything useful anymore except curl up and wait for them to be over. It took me more than a month to figure out a very limited amount of safe stuff to eat, which I ended up slowly expanding on over time. I did miss a few weeks of school when it first started though.
Directly after my math teacher’s class, she insisted I come to her and explain why I missed so many of her classes. I had a note from my GP ready, but she dismissed it. She told me she could tell that I wasn’t sick, but that I was just lazy and lying to everyone. I literally just walked away, and that was the closest I ever got to having a temper tantrum in class. In retrospect, I wish I had told her what I was really thinking.
#12 The Bobby Boucher Of Rugby
When I was in high school, we had this small, angry teacher who played rugby… or at least tried to. He was always belittling students to feel better about himself.
One day, we had physical ed class and our teacher couldn’t come, so the small, angry teacher who played rugby came to replace her.
He was trying to show off his skills at rugby. He made our class play some game where we had to tackle who had the ball.
We didn’t tackle hard enough so he joined to tackle some students in an attempt to show off his grandness. He was having fun being unstoppable and yelling at us.
I was kind of mad, so I just started running full speed at him. I ended up tackling him and he hit the ground so hard.
That was something our class laughed about all year.
#13 Classwork Boycott
My eighth-grade math teacher. She was the absolute worst and ruined any appreciation I had for mathematics forever. She’d purposely skip chapters and mark correct answers wrong if you wrote numbers a certain way. Also, pop quizzes. She had this rule where a pop quiz could cover ANY material out of the book even if it was something we hadn’t gone over yet. And it’s not like we could take the book home to study from it. It was one of those classes where the textbook had to be left in the classroom… I just quit doing any work for her after that. It made her so angry.
#14 The Nail In The Coffin
When I was a senior in high school, I had an AP English teacher who would grade people “based on how much she liked them” essentially. I had long hair and stretched earlobes so she despised me even though I was an excellent student in all aspects. She claimed I didn’t turn in assignments on time to justify my grades, so I spoke with my guidance counselor and she investigated for me.
Turns out, she had sorted completed assignments into piles of “good” and “bad” and would arbitrarily grade the papers based on who she felt sucked up to her the most that day. I presented a book report on The Odyssey which was by far the longest and most detailed presentation of the whole class and she gave me a D. I told her, “Screw you, this is the end of your career,” and walked out because I had sent an identical copy to the guidance counselor. She presented it to the school board and eventually got her fired. The best part was she was also a drivers ed instructor and she lost her job doing that as well. Apparently, I wasn’t the first to speak up about her but I was the one that put the nail in the coffin and it felt great.
#15 Fat Chance Of Ever Forgetting That One
I had a bit of a long-running feud with my chemistry teacher for reasons unbeknownst to me looking back, probably a personality clash or something.
Anyway, I used to be a right fatty in my school days, because, you know, carbs.
During one of our clashes one day he called me a fat bastard, so I promptly replied by calling him a “See-You-Next-Tuesday,” if you will.
Back in the day, that word was an insult reserved for the few. He didn’t report me to anyone and we never talked about it afterward.
#16 Better The Second Time Around
Freshman year of college. It was an Algebra class with around 100 or so students. The professor barely spoke English and “taught” us by literally reading from a book. We could hardly understand him and it was so dry and dull, everyone would just space out. The tests were ridiculously difficult. It didn’t matter how hard I studied—and I assure you, I studied very hard—I couldn’t break a low C on the quizzes and tests. No one could.
One day, he handed back our tests. It was one I busted my butt studying for, and the second I saw the big fat red ‘D’ at the top, I lost it. I stood up, said, “This is bull,” threw the test on the floor, and walked out. I didn’t return and obviously got an ‘F’ in the class.
I retook the course with another instructor the following semester and aced it (my final score was actually over 100 because I did all the extra assignments as well).
#17 Not Willing To Help
Ah yes, a long time ago in third grade, we were having a math lesson and the assistant was helping our teacher out. I wasn’t great at math at that young age so I would ask her for help, but then she would ignore me and move on to a different student. One time, I got so angry I slammed my fists on the desk. The whole room went silent and I said, “I need help on my math, can I please have some help?”
The principal came down and asked why I did that. She was really nice and I never got sent to the principal’s office before. I told her what happened and she gave a death-glare to the assistant.
#18 Flipper, The Bird
I once had some kind of stomach pain, the worst pain I’d felt my whole life, and I was in science class. I started groaning in agony in the first row and my bud next to me said I needed to leave and go to the hospital. I wanted to, but my teacher ignored me despite the fact that tears were already streaming down my face. A minute later I just stood up, walked to the door, and as soon as she tried to talk, I told her to pipe down and walked out with a raised middle finger. Then, I proceeded to throw up in the trash outside. Good times.
#19 Walk It Out
My American Lit teacher said not to quote the Bible in academic papers, then assigned me a compare and contrast paper on the Bible and American Indian myths. She gave me a C- for using the Bible…
When I tried to talk to her about it, she blew up in front of the whole class. I led a walk-out when she started going off. The next class, she looked angry and started focusing on me, so I led another walk-out.
#20 The Pickinator
We got this admin in my school wh we nicknamed “The Pickinator”. In my sophomore year, she was patrolling the school, Dolores-Umbridge-style. She loved ruining kids days, and she busted them for the most minor of things. This really annoying kid no one liked came up and snatched my backpack. I ran after him and ripped it out of his hands. Pickinator comes outside and immediately says, “You two, stop wrestling around and come with me.”
She escorted us to the office because apparently we were wrestling and fighting. I tried to tell her I was just getting my stuff back and she wasn’t having it. So I just said, “Well, I got my stuff back no reason to stick around now,” and went to my next class which was starting shortly.
I got called down later anyway but my admin pretty much told me she overreacted and to just forget it happened. Pickinator hates me now.
#21 A Typical Case Of The Stomach Shoe
My second-grade teacher was Sister Brigid. She didn’t like me at all. One day, I was feeling ill and I asked to use the restroom. She told me I was lying. As she tried to tell me why I was a liar, I vomited all over her shoes.
#22 Three Strikes, You’re Out
In Heidelberg, on my year abroad, my friend and I took a class that we thought would be interesting.
It wasn’t.
The teacher was a complete cow who hated her non-German students, and as we were the only two that semester… Go figure. She was okay with me after learning I was part German but awful to my friend.
We missed two classes overall (we had to return to our own universities for a little while. This was agreed on beforehand). However, the woman told my friend she automatically failed her class as she missed THREE classes.
We both decided to never go to her class again, or sit her exam.
Oddly enough, that exam never showed up on our year abroad credits, and we both passed with high marks.
#23 Learn By Doing
I’m in an advanced algebra class and not doing well. The teacher would lecture for the first half of the class and then give us the other half to do our homework.
Since I wasn’t doing well, I’d go to her desk a lot and ask for help on how to approach certain problems. She had this awful habit of just taking my notebook and finishing a problem.”Did that help?” she’d ask.
I was usually just polite and said yeah before walking back to my desk
One day, I got confused again, so I brought up my homework and she just does the problem with no explanation of how she got there. I kind of roll my eyes and she saw. She said if I didn’t want her help, then I shouldn’t go up to her anymore. I just kind of blurted out, “I came to you because I was confused on how to do these. You’re just showing me a completed problem and aren’t actually teaching me how to solve it.”
#24 Joke’s On You
I was in math class in high school and was having some difficulties solving a problem on the whiteboard (it was something that I should have known but I blanked). My teacher started to make fun of me, then rallied the other students to join in. I lost it and flipped her desk; then when I was walking out I punched a hole in the wall and then just left the school.
Surprisingly enough, I didn’t get in any trouble because a few of the other students went to the office after I left and told them what happened. The teacher lied and said I flipped out for no reason (I’m not the type of person to do that). The teacher got suspended and I got to change to a science research class that they counted as a math class for me.
#25 Parenting Done Right
In fifth grade, I had a teacher who disliked me because I was bullied a lot and she always had to take care of it. One day, I was playing kickball and got borderline assaulted by some kids. The teacher saw, came over, then let them go inside. She looked at me all dirt-covered and said, “Don’t go telling your dad about this!” The next day, my dad went to my school and had a very long talk with this teacher and the principal. I’m pretty sure she was hoping the school year would end sooner.
#26 Playing The Degree Card
I was a senior in college taking a chemistry class because it wasn’t required for my major until the end. Mind you, I’m an engineering student, so this freshman chemistry class is supposed to be a breeze. The last problem on the exam was mathematically ambiguous. I walked up to her and told her that, and she told me, “You’ll get it right.”
Fast forward a couple of weeks and she counted me off ten points for it. I ran it past a few friends and went to her office to very calmly lay out my reasoning. I wrote out a quick proof to show why it was mathematically ambiguous. I was right, and she even said I was right, but she refused to give me the points back because that would mean that she was wrong. She took the stance of, “I have a Ph.D. and you’re an undergrad.” Much cursing and anger later, I was kicked out of her office.
#27 Point Proven
In high school, I answered every question on an Algebra 2 exam correctly but got a 90%. I went through the test and there was not a single marking of a wrong answer. I asked the teacher why I had lost 10%, and he told me that because I used a pen, he took 10% off my grade.
I lost it. I must have spent five minutes trying to tell him how a test should be solely about my ability to demonstrate my understanding of the material, which I clearly grasped very well. And his final argument was that in college I would never get away with taking a test using a pen.
Two years later, I came back with my Calculus 3 exam, which I had taken in pen, and let him take a look at my fat 100%.
#28 A Day With A Shortened Temper
This might not seem like much of a temper, but overall, I was a quiet, respectful and non-confrontational student. One day in 10th-grade history, the students kept losing handouts and asking for extra copies from the teacher, and he was clearly sick of it. I had never asked for extras before, but someone must have packed up my handouts with theirs at the end of class because I couldn’t find mine. I went to ask him for some, super meekly, and apologizing. I knew he wouldn’t be happy, but I was a good, non-trouble kid, so I thought such a simple thing would not be a problem. I was wrong. I got lectured, glared at, yelled at, and I swear I must have been the last straw for him with how much he overreacted. I stared at him as coldly as I could and said calmly but with some serious venom, “Thanks for nothing.” He shouted after me, incredulous that I dared to speak to him that way, but I didn’t turn or stop. Damn, that felt good as a shy 14-year-old girl.
#29 Where’s Your Sense Of Community?
My math teacher in community college believed that the only way people could learn something was to place a book in front of them and let them figure it out themselves. He ignored our questions and pleas for help. It was a tough situation because we all had to pass this math class to graduate.
All he said to us was: “This is how other countries teach.” Finally, one day I snapped in class and told him to get his lazy butt off of his chair and teach like a normal professor. It was so agitating because he never explained to us that this is how he taught. He was normal for the first day and then he totally switched teaching methods the next. It was too late to drop the class without penalties.
#30 Deserving Of Unemployment
I once had a very terrible history teacher. This guy was something else. He was horrible to everyone and said some extremely questionable things. He never bothered me in particular too much; a few things here and there, but nothing super bad.
Well, my best friend drowned while canoeing with some other students. A few days later, the principal had a moment of silence for him and this teacher said, “Kid deserved it.” I lost my freaking mind. I started yelling at him and I was crying while he was just standing there with this smirk on his face. My friends pulled me out of the room while he called the principal. I ended up suspended but there was a walk-out the next day due to my suspension.
#31 Parting Gift
I had an issue with a chemistry TA losing my lab reports and other homework. After he confronted me about another missing assignment in our chem lab, we had a fairly heated exchange and I stormed out of the lab.
I made it about halfway across the large public campus before realizing I still had my lab goggles on.
I can only imagine what people thought of some random angry dude walking around with lab goggles on.
#32 Testing Patience
I had a history teacher in high school who decided that, because I was doing so well on my tests and not on the homework, I must be cheating on them. She proceeded to move the two people sitting next to me on the next test, only to find out I nearly aced it. The next test, both the person in front and behind, as well as the two next to me, were moved. Same result. The next test, she moved me into the hallway. Same result.
After all of this, she pulled me aside and said she would still be failing me on the exam because I must have had notes hidden somewhere. She had no proof, but low and behold I get a zero on the test. I took it up with the principal and he said nothing could be done. I walked back into the class and lost it on her when she handed me the test back with a large zero written across it. The next 14 weeks of school consisted of the same back and forth.
#33 Group Projects: The Bane Of Students’ Existence
This was the first—and up until now the last—time I had ever gotten so angry at someone. After six months of hard work on a Java project (which already sucked) and getting 80%+ grades on multiple tests, I got told that I failed my semester because my project partner did a lousy job on his part on the final product. This meant that I had to redo everything from scratch and get delayed for six months. I was so furious at the teacher who told me I failed that I walked to the nearest door and punched a hole in it. I broke my wrist and went home.
#34 Back Whence You Came
I had a French teacher in high school who was incredibly racist. I had heard about it from my older sister, but we all brushed off her concerns because she was generally dramatic about everything. He told racist jokes in class and then told the kids not to tell anyone outside. He would give better grades to caucasian kids who worked on the same projects as the non-white kids. Having had enough of it, I decided to withdraw from French as I felt I already knew the language and didn’t need that mess. I took a free block instead where I worked in the library. Other French teachers tried to talk me out of withdrawing from the program, but he argued that I wasn’t very good at French anyway and it was probably for the better.
One day, one of my friends who was a visible minority came running in the library crying. I don’t remember what he had said to her but it was pretty culturally insensitive. I marched up to his classroom with her and called him out for his racism, telling him off in French. After that school year, he stopped teaching and returned to France.
#35 Phone Yourself A Ride Away From Me
We were having serious home troubles and I needed to keep my phone on hand to stay in contact with my mother. A biology teacher came up behind me while was texting my mom and demanded I give him my phone. I calmly explained the situation and said why I needed the phone with me at all times. He proceeded to tell me how “insolent” I was, like he was Count Dooku, and continued to demand my phone. I said, “Welp, sorry, but no can do.” He stormed off and proceded to complain about me to other teachers, but I overheard and I went up to him to call him out in front of his colleagues.
#36 Cheat These Hands
I was once accused of cheating by a TA when I was in grad school. He said my work was similar to another student’s, which was true because we worked on the assignments together. However, there was no rule barring us from doing this. I called a meeting with the professor, the TA, my friend, and myself, and throughout the entire meeting the TA kept calling me a cheater, to the point where I told him that he was making me so angry and that if he called me a cheater one more time I was going to deck him. The professor immediately ended the meeting and restored my grades.
#37 A Swap Made In Heaven
In my 12th-grade history and social studies class, the teacher and I were political opposites.
She said something that was her opinion and passed it off as fact. I challenged her statement and she kept telling me I was wrong. I continued to argue, and we both started to raise our voices.
I stood up and walked toward the door. She asked me where I was going. I told her, “Down to the principal’s office because you’re going end up sending me there anyway if we continue to argue.”
I walked in and told the assistant, “Mrs. Johnson and I got into a heated argument.” They sent me to a counselor; I explained I didn’t have a problem arguing a valid point but I refused to be told I’m wrong about an opinion. She asked me what I wanted for a solution. I told her I wanted to be switched to Mr. Tyler’s class.
That was 33 years ago and I still speak with Mr. Tyler multiple times a year. Best teacher I’ve ever had.
#38 Why Can’t I Retake The Bloody Test?
One time while taking an exam in my Calculus ll class, I got a random bloody nose that dripped right on to the test. After explaining what happened, she said if I left the room to go clean up I wouldn’t be able to retake the test. My options were to grab another test and start over halfway through, without being able to copy my previous answers, or leave and fail the exam. I walked out of the classroom and withdrew before I got to my car.
#39 A Blessing In Disguise
I had my IT teacher turn off my PC while doing assignments on multiple occasions. He said to me: “You shouldn’t be doing your third assignment already.” Pretty sure he just didn’t like me, but I ended up losing my temper on a bad day, called him various names, and quit the same day. It ended up being the best move ever.
#40 Cold As A Cadaver
I had a high school English teacher that refused to believe that The Princess Bride by William Goldman was satirically called an abridged version of a book previously written by William S. Morgenstern. It took actual days of arguing with her to get her to accept my book report.
The same teacher had us write horror short stories for Halloween and wouldn’t read mine because she had come to a part with nudity in it. This was a story about a mortician, and the nudity was cold, clinical, and as far from sexual as possible. I ended up taking it to the principal and vice principal. They read it and told the teacher to give me a grade for it, so she gave me a C. Then she took me out in the hall, screamed at me for going over her head, and said her husband (who was a pastor, she constantly reminded the class) would want to come to the school and punch me in the face for having embarrassed her like that.
#41 Projectiles Are Always A Solid Solution
I threw a pen at a teacher in a third grade. We were writing short stories for the first time and after we were done, the teacher called me out to read my story out loud. As a bit of an introverted kid, I was too ashamed to do so. I refused two times before she took my essay, brought it back to her table and started to read it out loud. At that moment, the anxiety from the cringe inside me boiled over and I threw my (metal-cased) pen at her, only missing her head by an inch or so. She sent me to the hall to cool down, gave me a detention, and called my parents but she did not read my cringy story to the whole class. Totally worth it.
#42 Funniest Joke Of The Year
In high school, I received a D on a French essay I typed and was proud of. This cut-up girl in the class wrote hers during the lunch period before (I sat near her so I saw) and she even ended her essay with a written smiley face. She got an A. I was so hysterical I started laughing uncontrollably and was kicked out.
#43 That Escalated Very Quickly
My dad worked at the school as a janitor and there were a lot of problems at home. My substitute teacher told me that if I made any trouble she’d go and tell my dad. I sort of panicked and flew into a rage. I threw a table at her, along with a bunch of scissors and paper.
#44 So Who Really Won Here?
A teacher accused me of cheating when another student was caught trying to copy my exam. I don’t take false accusations very well. I grabbed a bookbag in a fit of rage and threw it at him. He dodged it but I got suspended anyway. I did not realize until afterward that I threw the bookbag of a girl I liked. She never spoke to me again, but I had a good week staying at home playing video games.
#45 Playing With My Money Is Like Playing With My Emotions
My professor was lazy. He passed out reading materials and barely answered questions. When he did not answer my question and asked me to read his copy-paste nonsense, I reminded him of how much I paid for him to teach and insinuated that I don’t like people messing with my money. He was more engaged in the class after that.
