Math teacher forced to use flawed software, maliciously complies with the help of her students: 'She had an army of eighth graders [...] send thousands of emails to the CEO'

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Ben Weiss • Writer and Editor
May 24, 2024 8:00 AM EDT

Teachers have to put up with more in one class than what most folks have to put up with in their entire careers.

As the child of a teacher, I can attest that it's far more than lesson planning, class time, and grading. It's also dealing with bureaucratic nonsense, entitled parents, difficult kids, and strange administrative policies that make absolutely no sense. In the case of this story, we are primarily dealing with the lattermost scenario. Here, we have an eighth-grade math teacher who was forced to use a completely flawed software that frequently got math problems wrong. Despite numerous attempts to communicate this fact to the higher-ups, the administration refused to believe the teacher and instead blamed her age as the reason for any technological problems. So, all the teacher could do was contact the company directly, and that's exactly what she did… with the help of her entire class. 

It turns out the best part about teaching eighth grade is that you can bribe your students with gummy bears. Keep scrolling below for the full story and for the consequences of this nonsensical company's software platform. For more tales of malicious compliance, check out this post about a neighbor's feud with his HOA.

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  • 01
    "How my 8th grade math teacher fought corporate greed and negligence with the power of gummy bears"
    via Ivan Aleksic
  • 02
    I know that's a wild ride of a title, but I promise it's all true so buckle up When I was in eighth grade, I was in the first year of an experimental technology school. I had a class of about 180 eighth graders (12-14 year olds) and about 10 teachers.
    via storymaker1235
  • 03
    So everybody shared the same math teacher. For our first semester we used a software called Gage. Its was alright for most classes, but it was absolutely atrocious when it came to math.
    via storymaker1235
  • 04
    Nothing worked with math. We were supposed to use the lessons they had, but it just didn't work. Math symbols didnt show up right and some questions even had the wrong answer marked.
    via storymaker1235
  • 05
    My math teacher wasn't allowed to just move to paper, and the company insisted that the problem was that our math teacher was older and just didn't understand technology. They said that if she had a genuine issue to email them.
    via storymaker1235
  • 06
    One day, I get to class, and there are 7 email addresses written on the board. She told us that we were going to go through our math lesson today, and take screenshots of every mistake we found and email them to the companies executives. One screenshots = one email. 10 emails = a packet of gummy bears.
    via storymaker1235
  • 07
    We had a blast trying to send as many emails as we could. One kid got ten packets of gummy bears by end of the hour class.
    via storymaker1235
  • 08
    By lunch the principal called my teacher aside and asked for her to stop. She said " no! My afternoon classes haven't had fun yet!"
    via storymaker1235
  • 09
    Long story short, our school district got all of its money back from using the software, and the company no longer exists (or they changed their brand out of shame. Idk, I just cant find them anymore)
    via storymaker1235
  • 10
    Tl;dr: the software company said to email if she found a actual issue, so she had an army of either graders, inspired by gummy bears, send thousands of emails to the CEO and other executives.
    via storymaker1235
  • 11
    Chaotic Thoughts905 The power of gummy bears is something that should never be underestimated!
    via storymaker1235
  • 12
    ikea-lingonberry As a teacher, I 100% believe this. Especially for packets of gummy bears! What could be a better motivator? Awesome story, OP! Hope this gets to the front page!
    via storymaker1235
  • 13
    gaviniboom The company with the buggy software saying that the teacher's older and just doesn't understand technology... ... projecting much?
    via storymaker1235
  • 14
    katieno14. - She was also still teaching math - you can't take a screenshot of a wrong answer if you don't know it's wrong. Very smart!
    via storymaker1235
  • 15
    krazekrittermom. I don't remember gummi bears but I DO REMEMBER this issue with that company!! I think I might love your math teacher.
    via storymaker1235

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class corporate school students malicious compliance ceo emails teacher reddit thread Reddit math
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