American student Ashley Arnold (Ashley Arnold) complained about a teacher at the University of Southern New Hampshire, which unfairly put her unsatisfactory assessment. Judging by the published correspondence, the teacher refused to acknowledge that Australia is not only a continent, but also a country.
As BuzzFeed told , the 27-year-old Arnold brings up the child and is trained from home on the university’s online courses, trying to get a degree in sociology. For the last course she paid almost $ 1000.

As a last project, students were asked to compare social norms in the US and any other country. Ashley chose Australia and focused on social media. The student passed a research project and on February 1 found out that the Ph.D. had put her points to zero on several points. The professor pointed out that “without the choice of a particular country this category is not assessed.”
We deeply regret the interaction between our professor & our student. We have apologized to Ashley, replaced the instructor, & are reimbursing her tuition for the course. To our friends in Australia, we know that you are a country & a continent, best of luck in the Olympic games!
— SNHU (@SNHU) 9 February 2018
People with her level of education and experience should not know that Australia is a country? If she doubts or asks about this, why should not she just google it?
Angry Arnold wrote to the teacher by e-mail, attaching links to professional literature indicating that Australia is a country. However, the doctor of philosophy did not admit a mistake, agreeing only to reconsider the project.
Before I revise the project, you must understand that any error can cross out everything. Australia is a continent, it is not a country. This mistake has made it so that it is almost impossible to properly arrange your two-week work.
Then the professor conducted an “independent study” and still put a new estimate of B +, which is equivalent to the “four with plus.”
The teacher never apologized, but admitted that she had “a misunderstanding of the differences between Australia-country and Australia-continent”. She asked the student to check the information and in the future not to confuse data about the country and the continent.
The student asked journalists not to disclose the name of the professor, because she did not want “no reaction” because the teacher worked not in the university staff, but under the contract. Arnold explained that she told her story because of fear for injustice to other students.
Nevertheless, as confirmed by HuffPost, Ph.D. was fired. The university also made a public apology.