In November, a University of Oklahoma student named Samantha Fulnecky received a zero for a psychology paper. The assignment was a 650-word response to a study of middle school students, which found that students that were “high in gender typicality” — think, athletic boys and well-dressed, attractive girls — were described as more popular by their peers, and that this effect was particularly pronounced for boys. Students, the study revealed, who were less gender typical tended to be teased and bullied more.
If she had just complained to her professor about the grade — which she did almost immediately — we would never have known about this. But according to Alexia Aston in The Oklahoman, just hours after the instructor refused to raise her grade, Fulnecky emailed the governor of Oklahoma, “O.U. President Joe Harroz Jr., her college’s dean, news outlets and the Teacher Freedom Alliance, led by former state schools Superintendent Ryan Walters, asking for help.” Fulnecky’s paper, which was published in full on the X account of the O.U. chapter of the conservative student group Turning Point USA, cited the Bible as her only source and did not seem to grapple much with the content of the original material.
The original study assigned to Fulnecky is not specifically about transgender youth, but a sample passage of her paper reads: “My prayer for the world and specifically for American society and youth is that they would not believe the lies being spread from Satan that make them believe they are better off as another gender than what God made them.”
The graduate student teaching assistant who graded the paper wrote that it “does not answer the questions for this assignment, contradicts itself, heavily uses personal ideology over empirical evidence in a scientific class, and is at times offensive.” The teaching assistant, who is reportedly transgender, had a second teaching assistant (who is not transgender) look at the paper, and that one concurred with the original grade.
Fulnecky says she is a victim of religious discrimination and lodged a formal complaint with the university. The teaching assistant who gave her the grade has been placed on administrative leave, and the university said in a statement on X that “a formal grade appeals process was conducted. The process resulted in steps to ensure no academic harm to the student from the graded assignments.”
Some of this is familiar. Remember the N.Y.U. students who petitioned their school about their organic chemistry professor’s overly high standards? The school did not defend him and his contract was terminated, even though the students never demanded that he be fired. But what makes this example different is the way Fulnecky went directly to the media and conservative organizations to publicize her case. When Ryan Walters, one of the people she emailed, was Oklahoma’s state schools superintendent, he demanded that all schools teach the Bible, and that teachers not from Oklahoma pass a screening test to ward off “woke indoctrination.” He told Fox News earlier this year, about his new job at the conservative Teacher Freedom Alliance, “We’re going to destroy the teachers’ unions.”
Culture warriors like Fulnecky and the Oklahoma conservative politicians supporting her are merely taking advantage of a decades-long trend in higher education: Students think they are customers who deserve to be catered to, rather than curious humans who might have something to learn. With the Trump administration going to war with universities, and Oklahoma’s freedom caucus, a group of right-wing state legislators, decrying “O.U.’s descent into radical activism” and demanding a public apology to Fulnecky while threatening a funding cut, you can see how hard it is for even the most stalwart college presidents to stand up for the principles of academic freedom.
Inside Higher Ed does an annual student voice survey that polls thousands of current college students from across the country, and this year’s results showed that 65 percent of college students “consider themselves customers of their institution in some capacity, defined in the survey as expecting to have their needs met and be empathized with because they are paying tuition and fees.” I.H.E.’s Colleen Flaherty explains that this thinking can undermine the teacher-student relationship. For example, it can lead to bad outcomes like grade inflation, which is rampant at even the most elite institutions, because administrators want satisfied students, and bad grades make very unhappy customers.
Flaherty cites a 2010 paper called, “The customer isn’t always right: Limitations of ‘customer service’ approaches to education or why Higher Ed is not Burger King,” which has an elegant explanation of the difference between education and a typical consumer transaction. “An education can not be had unless the person being educated is engaged in the process. Lessons can be given, but learning remains the responsibility of the learner. The practice of education is, then, necessarily cooperative; it is not a simple exchange of services for pay.”
To paraphrase the old Burger King slogan, she wants to have the class and the grade delivered her way. While there have certainly been incidents where liberal students have behaved like angry customers trying to demand a specific experience, conservatives have a well-oiled machine of outside groups helping them to weaponize their complaints.
In their 2022 book, “The Channels of Student Activism: How the Left and Right Are Winning (and Losing) in Campus Politics Today,” the sociologists Amy J. Binder and Jeffrey L. Kidder describe the media blueprint for conservative students. “The incentive structure in campus politics is increasingly oriented toward confrontation, especially on the right. One faculty adviser to several conservative clubs at [The University of Arizona] explained the multiple components of the strategy, from initially causing a stir to eventually presenting a burnished résumé that looks good in the realm of right-leaning politics.”
Fulnecky caused a stir, and on Dec. 3, she spoke at a meeting of the Oklahoma Constitutional Principles Affecting Culture Foundation, a conservative think tank. While I can’t say if she learned anything in the classroom, she has certainly memorized the plan for becoming a right-wing heroine.
End Notes
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I loved this essay by my pal Amanda Fortini in T about why Gen X is the greatest generation. Born in 1982, I am technically a millennial but I have always felt more Gen X, and the cultural touch tones in this story help explain why — particularly the references to Liz Phair’s “Exile in Guyville” and “Whip-Smart,” which I listened to on repeat in college. Here’s a litmus test: If you can remember where you were when Kurt Cobain died, as Fortini recounts at the beginning of her story, you are spiritually Gen X. (I was sleeping over at Katie Albert’s house and her older brother told us).
Feel free to drop me a line about anything here.
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