Ten Ways to Annoy Your College Professors

There are many things students hate in college. Long term papers, group presentations, lengthy lectures, pop quizzes, and more. Yet for all the time spent considering what college students hate, far too little time is spent considering what might irk your professor.

That isn't wise. Your professor, after all, is the one who grades you. You rely on those tenants of higher education's halls to educate you. You rely on them to get into graduate programs. You rely on them to help you pass everything from Introduction to Guitar to Advanced Physics. They are, in other words, the people you do not want to annoy. Here are ten things college students do that annoy their professors. Avoid these, and make your life as a college student a little easier, if not more pleasant, in the classroom.

1. Don't show up for class (or, show up late).

First, let's talk about not showing up at all. Professors are investing just as much, if not more, time as you in your classes. It's disrespectful, and for many even offensive, for you to decide not to show up. That's not to say if you're sick or have a personal emergency you should drag yourself in anyway. But it's best to let your professor know as soon as possible if you won't be in class, or even if you think you won't be in class. Have a good reason. Having the flu is a good reason; not wanting to miss the second airing of the season finale of House is not. The only thing potentially worse than not showing up at all is to show up late. Especially if you're really late, which can sometimes mean if you're more than two minutes late. It tells your professor that you didn't care enough about his or her class to be there on time. I once had a class where a student burst into class at ten minutes before the end of class, announcing, "Well, I guess I made it!" as if he'd accomplished something amazing. The professor, to say the least, was not pleased.

2. Make an appointment to discuss a class you missed.

Most professors like students who take the initiative to meet with them outside of class hours. But I can't think of one professor who would want to sit down with you for an hour or more to recount to you a class lecture you missed. Get the notes from a friend.

3. Make an appointment during Office Hours, and don't show up.

Professors set aside office hours for you, but that doesn't mean they're just sitting there anxiously anticipating your arrival. It means they'll take you if you come, but if not, they have better things to do. Not showing up for an appointment means you've just wasted a part of your professor's planning or personal time. You might not think a missed appointment could affect your grade, but for some professors it's a personal enough issue that it just might.

4. Tell your professor he/she is too picky.

I once had a professor who would subtract points from your grade for every passive verb (is, was, has, has been, etc.) per page over three. It meant your grade could go from an A to a B because of the word "was." It seems a little over the top, but professors do these things for a reason. They aren't just trying to torture you; they're trying to show you how to improve upon something you might already do well enough but could do better. Telling your professor you think she's too picky about something in her grading style is disrespectful to her and the work she put into teaching you. That said, it can still prove beneficial to talk to your professor about the way he graded your paper. Maybe he was being a little overzealous. If you do talk to a professor about his or her "pickiness" over a grade, make sure you do it respectfully.

5. Ask for an extension the day an assignment is due.

Never, ever show up to class without an assignment done the day it is due and expect to receive an extension on it. If you don't have it finished, it means you knew you weren't going to have it finished. You could have asked days ago. Though it's never a good thing to hand in an incomplete assignment, I'd venture to say it's better to hand in something shortly incomplete-i.e. a nine page paper instead of ten-than to waltz in expecting an extension as your professor collects the assignment.

6. Tell your professor you won't do an assignment because it is too long.

You might think, "Come on, I'd never do that." But it's been done. In one of my college classes, a professor assigned a six page paper on a sonnet. That's six pages on fourteen lines of poetry. While no one in my class complained to the professor about it (at least not that they told any other classmates), three years later I had another student taking the same class come to me and complain. She said the assignment was bizarre in its length, and so she wasn't going to do it. In her words (not verbatim, but to the point), "I'll write what I can and she'll have to be happy with it." That's not the way college works. If your professor says to write ten pages, you'd better write ten pages. If your professor says write about five pages, write six. Remember, you're not the first person to ever do this assignment. And if your professor has assigned it, it means at least in some realm it is possible to complete.

7. Ask your professor to reschedule an exam.

In another of my classes, a student was planning on going to Florida for fall break. She planned her flight for the last day of classes before break began. We had a test that day; she asked the professor to reschedule it for after the break. The professor, in his understandable ire, rescheduled it for a week before we were supposed to have it. Professors take time to schedule their classes long before you start taking them. There's a reason a test is on a certain date, and that reason is not to mess up your tanning plans. Asking a professor to reschedule an exam to suit your schedule is extremely disrespectful, and often winds up making you the goat of the class if your professor exacts revenge the way mine did.

8. Cite the WritingCenter as a defense that your grade should be higher.

This is one of my personal favorites. While I was a tutor at the Writing Center, I was asked to meet with one of my professors after class. The professor was annoyed not with me, but with a fellow classmate who had me read her paper. Said student received a "C" on the paper, and protested the grade. Her reason for protesting? I had read and commented on her paper and said outside of the points I'd highlighted for her it looked okay to me. A good Writing Center tutor never tells you what grade he or she thinks your paper will earn, because Writing Center tutoring is not about getting you a higher grade. It's about improving aspects of your paper. And even if a tutor says he or she thinks your paper is good, it doesn't mean that's a good reason to say your professor's grading is unfair. The only person whose opinion counts in regard to your paper's grade is the professor who grades it.

9. Ask your professor the guidelines of an assignment the day before it is due.

Besides being disrespectful to your professor, who has probably outlined the assignment long before its due date, this is just plain foolishness. It tells your professor you probably haven't even started the assignment yet. It sets you up for your professor to take effort into consideration while grading your assignment. And it makes you look pretty foolish in front of your other classmates. Don't do it. If you're not sure, ask a classmate.

10. Ask a professor for a recommendation if you've done any of the above.

Basically, you only ask a professor for a recommendation if you've done exemplary work in his class, and if she likes you enough to write a good review. Asking a professor for a recommendation knowing full well that you slept through half of her class is like asking someone to catch you when, just before you jumped, you called her a fat idiot. Likewise, if you have even the slightest notion that you've been an annoyance to your professor, asking him to write you a recommendation just because he's the Chair of your department is probably a bad idea. Besides being foolish on your part (What are the chances you'll get a good recommendation?), it tells the professor that you're just using him or her for his or her name or title. Keep this in mind: While it may annoy your professor that you even asked to begin with, it can still give him or her great pleasure to write a bad review.