The University of Oklahoma has removed a teaching assistant who gave a student an F grade on a psychology paper which sparked outrage from conservatives and prompted claims of religious discrimination.
“Based on an examination of the graduate teaching assistant’s prior grading standards and patterns, as well as the graduate teaching assistant’s own statements related to this matter, it was determined that the graduate teaching assistant was arbitrary in the grading of this specific paper,” the University said in a Monday statement.
“The graduate teaching assistant will no longer have instructional duties at the University.”
It comes after Samantha Fulnecky, a junior at the university, reported her psychology instructor Mel Curth after receiving the grade and claimed she received zero points out of 25 “for my beliefs and using freedom of speech, and especially for my religious beliefs.”
The assignment was to write a 650-word essay reacting to a psychology article about the effect of gender norms on middle school students and their impact on mental health.
Fulnecky’s complaint was promoted by the university’s chapter of Turning Point USA, a conservative nonprofit founded by Charlie Kirk, who was assassinated in September. The group posted Fulnecky’s essay and Curth’s response online and blasted the educator, who uses she/they pronouns, writing: “We should not be letting mentally ill professors around students.”
That post drew quick reactions online with people taking sides – some defending the professor and calling the paper ‘poor.’ While others defended Fulnecky.
In Curth’s feedback, Curth had said Fulnecky was entitled to her own beliefs, but that the psychology article was based on years of psychological research and evidence, not just society “pushing lies.”
In its Monday statement, the university said that Fulnecky’s two claims, one appealing the grade and the other formally complaining of “illegal religious discrimination,” had been resolved.
“As already announced, the grade appeal was decided in favor of the student, removing the assignment completely from the student’s total point value of the class, resulting in no academic harm to the student,” UO said. “The claim for discrimination has been investigated and concluded. The University does not release findings from such investigations.”
The university added the provost, the University’s highest ranking academic officer and the academic dean, reviewed the full facts of the matter, before their decision.
“The University of Oklahoma believes strongly in both its faculty’s rights to teach with academic freedom and integrity and its students’ right to receive an education that is free from a lecturer’s impermissible evaluative standards,” the statement read.
“We are committed to teaching students how to think, not what to think. The University will continue to review best practices to ensure that its instructors have the comprehensive training necessary to objectively assess their students’ work without limiting their ability to teach, inspire, and elevate our next generation.”
In her original essay, Fulnecky repeatedly cited the Bible and emphasized her right to free speech, stating she believes “eliminating gender in our society would be detrimental, as it pulls us farther from God’s original plan for humans.”
“Society pushing the lie that there are multiple genders and everyone should be whatever they want to be is demonic and severely harms American youth,” she wrote.
However, many online agreed with Curth’s assessment of the essay, criticizing her writing ability, lack of sources and digression from the instructions. “Her paper was absolutely embarrassing. She failed to follow directions, didn’t meet the word count and didn’t cite a single source,” one user wrote on X.
Another instructor for the course, Megan Waldron, said she concurred with Curth’s F grade, saying Fulnecky’s essay “should not be considered as a completion of the assignment.”
