Students get terrible teacher fired by doing exactly what he says: 'He was fired later that day...'

Author image for Brad Dickson
Brad Dickson • Managing Editor
Aug 5, 2024 10:00 AM EDT

It sometimes happens in life that there's a discrepancy between your own abilities and what you imagine them to be. This overestimation can have wildly different repercussions, but sometimes, it just earns you a role in management. See, that unearned confidence seems to translate really well in interviews with people who have no idea that you don't know what you're talking about, meaning that the false bravado can land you a job you were never really cut out for. (Cue managers everywhere looking nervously around themselves.) 

Still, sometimes, you might be aware of your shortcomings and try to overcompensate for them, practically demanding that people see you in the way that you want to be seen, leaving those with lording over exchanging awkward glances as they try to avoid coming into the line of fire while your ego reaches a critical mass and threatens to collapse in on itself.

There especially seems to be a type within high school teachers who used to teach university courses and can't quite let go of the fact that they're no longer doing so. I'm sure we've all had a teacher or a boss who was a bit like this, and we probably did everything we could to stay the heck out of their way. These students took a different approach, steering into it and complying with the teacher's demands until they got fired.

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  • 01
    "He was fired later that day..."
    via Dylan Gillis
  • 02
    Teacher wouldn't listen, so the entire class complied and he got fired XL OC TLDR at bottom This happened in the early 2000's in my junior year of high school. The district had just built the 3rd high school in our city and most of the teachers were new. The band director was one of those new hires. He was qualified for the job, but had zero people skills and was extremely abrasive towards students. He had previously taught university, and could not wrap his head around the fact that high school
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  • 03
    His normal behavior consisted of berating students for not knowing university level curriculum, talking down to everyone about how he can't understand why they were so incompetent, and stopping rehearsals to go on long tangents about things. that had NOTHING to do with music. Every day at least 2-3 students would leave class in tears. We complained to the higher ups and they repeatedly brushed is off. He made students HATE attending his music classes, and many dropped band and orchestra as a res
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  • 04
    One of the classes he taught was supposed to be "intro to music theory". For those who don't know music, this would be a class that should typically teach things like different types of chords, the definition of music symbols, the logic behind key changes etc... At the first class of the year there were about 25 kids enrolled. Most of these were music and drama kids who wanted to be teachers or performers in the arts one day. On the first day he handed us a quiz because he wanted to see how much
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  • 05
    No one got a single answer right. That's how advanced it was. Imagine signing up for what you think is a basic pre algebra class and walking into advanced calculus. This teacher spent the entire class period berating us for not being prepared when no one could even attempt his quiz. We told him "this is an intro class, none of us have learned anything like this before" and his response was "Really? I thought this was an advanced class" The next class period there were maybe 15 kids enrolled. He
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  • 06
    and then berated us for not being prepared. At every class he would say "I thought you all were musicians, this is supposed to be an advanced class!" By the end of the second week, there were 6 students left enrolled in this class, including myself. He softened up slightly to those of us who stayed, and seemed to think we were his prize students and that this was his class of elites (think professor Slughorn from Harry Potter). In truth, we all thought he was insane and cruel, but the 6 of us ha
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  • 07
    now, every student connected to music in the school hated this guy, and repeated complaints had done nothing to fix the problem. The admins filed away every complaint, but never did anything more than remind him that he's supposed to be more kind to students. He changes nothing, and still berates students and makes them cry.
    via u/Heavy_Ad9344
  • 08
    So when it comes to the final exam for his theory class, he decides that he wants to give it to us early, so that on the day the final is supposed to be scheduled, we can have a class party instead. Of the 6 of us left, 4 of us have the same period after his class together as well. That class was AP English, and we were prepping for the AP test. We had no problem with a class party in music right before the AP prep exam, so we didn't complain. The day comes of our music final exam and after we f
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  • 09
    We try to tell him all the issues with this plan. We aren't allowed to leave campus without permission slips (it was a closed campus policy due to an incident where a student who left campus for lunch got hit by a car and was killed), we will not get back in time for 2nd period, which is a final exam, HE doesn't have permission to remove us from the campus, what if there is an emergency and we are unaccounted for because we aren't even at the school?
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  • 10
    His solution was to tell us that after the start of class on our final class day, he would be going to IHOP, and if we wanted to join him, that was our choice, but if we didn't we would have to stay in the classroom and not bring attention to the next that there was no class and no teacher.
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  • 11
    Without talking about it to each other, the 6 of us saw an opportunity to finally get the admins attention to the complete disregard this teacher had for rules and policies. We made sure to inform our English teacher that we might be late to class on the day of the final, due to a class field trip for music theory. She was irritated and reminded us that this final was very important and that she would not give us extra time if we came in late.
    via u/Heavy_Ad9344
  • 12
    We told her that we understood, and gave her details about where we would be and what we would be doing and who we would be with. She said she still expected us to be in her class. On the day of the final, we all went to IHOP. It took forever to get there because of construction, and forever to get our food because the restaurant was newly opened and had a large number of customers. We got back to the school halfway through our 2nd period class. The admins were waiting for us. Security was waiti
    via u/Heavy_Ad9344
  • 13
    called the front office to complain that 4 of her best students were missing and that she was fairly certain we weren't even on campus. The admins had checked attendance and seen that we were all marked present that morning, and they had searched the entire school looking for our class. The 4 of us walked into our English final to a livid teacher. We knew she was at us, but couldn't punish us beyond saying we had the same remaining time as the rest of the class.
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    (since we had been with a teacher in our absence). None of us did as well in the final as we could have if we had the full 87 minutes, but we were doing well enough in the class already that the lesser marks didn't effect our overall grade too much. The band teacher had a "private" reprimand that was so loud the entire school could hear it. He was confused as to why the administration was upset that he took minor children off campus without permission or notice,
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  • 15
    without proper school transportation, or even a good reason. He stayed with his usual attitude, but this time towards the admins: "why are you guys so incompetent about this, they are old enough to drive, what's the problem?" The English teacher (who I actually adore, and was one of the best teachers I've ever had) absolutely went Mama Bear on the administration about how they could continue to employ someone who disrespects the other teachers so much as to deprive his students of their final ex
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  • 16
    He was fired later that day. Many of the students had a gleeful but confused reaction, since the 6 of us weren't talking to anyone about it. All most people knew was that this tyrant of a teacher was gone. We didn't spread the story very much of how it happened because we still feared being reprimanded for our involvement, since he technically have us a choice to go with him or stay, but I always smiled when people gossiped about what the final straw was that got him fired. TLDR: teacher told us
    via u/Heavy_Ad9344
  • 17
    IWantTheLastSlice 11 hr. ago. edited 9 hr. ago When I was a sophomore in HS, I had an English teacher who was just like this guy. Nothing as dramatic as the OP story but definitely acted like he was teaching an advanced literature class at Harvard instead of an intro class.
    via u/Heavy_Ad9344
  • 18
    One specific funny thing I do remember: We were reading sections of some book out loud and he criticized one student for clearly saying the word "forehead", as in a person's forehead. He insisted it was pronounced like "forid", even after the whole class argued with him. He wouldn't give in and was visibly annoyed by the end of class.
    via u/Heavy_Ad9344
  • 19
    A few weeks later, he gets finished yelling at the class about something and it's really quiet. When he turns his back on the class, someone quietly but very clearly says, "FOREHEAD". The whole class cracked up and he turned red with anger. Think he lasted a few years only.
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  • 20
    ZirePhiinix 14 hr. ago He didn't sound like he did well at University level either, and something like this is going to black list him hopefully so he doesn't traumatize more kids.
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  • 21
    EHP42 13 hr. ago I think there's an issue where some teachers decide that THEIR education level determines the baseline of their teaching. Or they teach at the level they wish they could, and not the actual level of the course. Which is truly insane One of the best teachers I ever had was my physics teacher. He had a PhD and spent summers doing research at CERN. But he
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  • 22
    knew how to teach the material at our level, but also how to tie it into the most cutting edge advances in the field, which he explained at our level. I think I'm OP's case, some people just aren't meant to be teachers.
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  • 23
    inflateion 14 hr. ago • One of my hobbies through life so far has been music, I can't imagine being a complete beginner and having someone try to test you on advanced theory, I still barely know much of it myself, let alone 5 years ago when I was in highschool. What a of a teacher twit
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    Responsible-End7361 14 hr. ago I wonder if the admin felt they had gotten lucky getting someone qualified to teach university in the high school, and that was why they didn't want to lose him. "His qualifications are so much better than the other applicants!" Never asking why someone with those credentials had to teach high school instead of college (betcha he got fired there too).
    via u/Heavy_Ad9344
  • 25
    Jboyes 14 hr. ago Preceptor Provides Pancakes. Students Subvert Studies.
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  • 26
    raven-of-the-sea 13 hr. ago • I had a theater teacher like that. He got fired for refusing to issue a schedule for rehearsals and randomly making us check for if we had to stay after. At a Northern Virginia High School. During the DC Sniper panic. The Journalism teacher took over and the other guy wasn't missed.
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  • 27
    prankerjoker 12 hr. ago You all banded together for a well orchestrated malicious compliance.
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  • 28
    figgypie 12 hr. ago This is one of the biggest reasons why I hate bad teachers. They can the joy out of things and completely derail a student's dreams.
    via u/Heavy_Ad9344

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malicious compliance malicious compliance reddit workplace malicious compliance student university students teachers teacher Terrible Teacher
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