The BC Version of ‘The Dog Ate My Homework’

The Most Interesting Excuses BC Professors Have Ever Heard from Students About Missing Class or Assignments

Sometimes things go wrong and students are not able to keep up with college tasks. Students may oversleep, forget to turn in their assignment, or trip over the sidewalk on their way to class. When these things happen, students tend to come up with excuses. Some are reasonable, while others are completely imaginative. Bluefield College professors have heard all sorts of excuses from their students.

Some excuses are more common than others. Psychology professor Dr. Richard Farmer has heard excuses like “my dog got loose and bit my neighbor” and “I forgot what day of the week it was.” Similar to Dr. Farmer, American Sign Language professor Melissa Linkous shares that she’s heard excuses such as “my dog was sick” and “I had more important assignments to complete.”

Math professor Dr. Kathleen Buterakos encourages her students to tell the truth no matter the circumstances. Her students have truthfully told her things like, “I couldn’t commute to school because of a flat tire. I tried to put on the spare, but it was already on the car” and “I’m sorry I overslept for my 12 p.m. class.”

However, Dr. Buterakos has an all-time favorite excuse that she fully supports: “My favorite excuse that I wholeheartedly encourage is, ‘I had to go home for my mother’s birthday.'”

Dr. Henry Clary, a Christian studies professor, takes plagiarism seriously. Students who plagiarize are going against the BC Honor Code. The Honor Code prevents students from using the information or words they find in other sources as their own.

“I once had a student that I caught red-handed copying and pasting his paper from an internet source,” Dr. Clary said. “When I confronted him, he proudly explained that where he comes from that imitation is the highest form of flattery and thus I should accept what he did and simply grade it. I let him know that here at our school we consider passing someone else’s work off as your own as cheating and an act of academic dishonesty. He didn’t like that answer.”

Biology professor Dr. Martin Offield shared a similar excuse from a student that violated the BC Honor Code.

“I once had a student’s dad – who was a pastor – tell me that he thought it was reasonable that his daughter would assume it was okay to work on online quizzes together with her boyfriend because the syllabus didn’t explicitly prohibit it,” Dr. Offield said.

A common reason why students miss class is because they have a doctor’s appointment scheduled during class time. To have these absences excused, students must provide a signed doctor’s note. Dr. Offield received a questionable doctor’s note from one of his students once.

“One of the most infamous excuses I can remember is of a student who missed an exam and sent me a doctor’s note to support his claim of being ill,” Dr. Offield said. “Since I didn’t recognize the name of the doctor or the clinic, I called the clinic to check it out. Aside from not having the person as a patient or having any record of him coming to the clinic, the doctor on the note was an ophthalmologist – an eye doctor.”

Dr. Kevin Downer, an exercise and sports science professor, received an excuse that simply made no sense. It said, “I thought the coursework was completed in the lab class,” but Dr. Downer does not teach any lab courses.

Communications professor Dr. Cindy Bascom heard the following excuse from one of her student-athletes: “I’m so sorry. I thought I turned in my homework, but I had a tiresome workout.” This excuse is certainly a possibility considering a large percentage of BC students are student-athletes.

However, Dr. Bascom has also heard an excuse from a student that was disturbing. She received an e-mail from one of her students saying, “Sorry I haven’t been in class. My late girlfriend killed herself last Wednesday. I’ve been dealing with that and waking up next to a dead body. This isn’t cool.” Linkous also heard a similar excuse from the same student: “My girlfriend was pregnant with twins and she had a miscarriage.” However, both of these excuses turned out to be fabrications. When BC administrators went to the student’s room to check on him, his girlfriend (alive and well) answered the door.

Some students take making excuses too far. They lie to their professors and manipulate them by making them believe things that are not true, and while suicides and miscarriages are not topics to be taken lightly, many BC professors believe that COVID-19 has become the most often used excuse.

“Nowadays, the common excuses all revolve around needing to be away from class or at home because of COVID,” Dr. Clary said. “Granted, that may be true some of the time, but it happens so frequently that I suspect some students are using COVID as an excuse to be lazy.”

The COVID-19 pandemic has prompted BC to offer virtual learning through Microsoft Teams. This allows students in quarantine and isolation to attend class online. Unfortunately, many students have taken advantage of this by using it as an excuse not to attend class in person simply out of convenience. Some have even used it as an excuse not to attend class at all.

“I have to take my classes online, and my computer does not work,” was one excuse a student gave Dr. Bascom. While technical difficulties are common, BC has an Information Technology (IT) office that assists students who are having computer issues, so students can easily seek help by reaching out to IT. However, it is also possible that the student could be living at home, therefore being too far from campus.

It can be challenging to tell whether a student is being truthful or not when they make up excuses. Some excuses are lies, some are imaginative, some are common, but some are excusable. Overall, students will have a difficult time fooling their BC professors.