A University of Oklahoma student who received a zero out of 25 on an assignment regarding gender norms says she was targeted for her Christian beliefs, citing a scathing response from the teacher’s assistant who doled out the grade.
Samantha Fulnecky is a junior pre-med student at the Sooner State’s flagship university.
“I was asked to read an article and give my opinion on the article, and the article was about gender binary and mental health and gender stereotypes, specifically in children, because it’s a lifespan development class,” Fulnecky told Fox News Digital. “So I was asked to give my opinion and my reaction to the paper.”
Fulnecky and her classmates were tasked with writing a response to a scholarly article titled “Relations Among Gender Typicality, Peer Relations, and Mental Health During Early Adolescence,” summarizing results of a study about gender norms among middle schoolers and the social ramifications children may face for not conforming to gender norms.
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Students were asked to provide a “thoughtful discussion of some aspect of the article.” The assignment provided eight suggestions for how to respond, including, “An application of the study or results to your own experiences,” “Your own thoughts about how development proceeds in the domain being researched in the article” and whether the student thought the topic was worthy of further study.
“So I did this assignment the same as I would any other in that class, gave my opinion on gender binary and gender stereotypes and that, naturally my views are from the Bible and my Christian kind of worldview,” she said. “And so that’s what I wrote about and I didn’t think anything of it.”
Fulnecky, citing her Christian beliefs, responded that traditional gender roles should be reinforced, not degraded.
“The article discussed peers using teasing as a way to enforce gender norms. I do not necessarily see this as a problem. God made male and female and made us differently from each other on purpose and for a purpose,” Fulnecky wrote in her essay. “God is very intentional with what He makes, and I believe trying to change that would only do more harm.”
“Gender roles and tendencies should not be considered ‘stereotypes,'” her essay continued. “Women naturally want to do womanly things because God created us with those womanly desires in our hearts. The same goes for men. God created men in the image of His courage and strength, and He created women in the image of His beauty. He intentionally created women differently than men and we should live our lives with that in mind.”
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Later in her essay, she denounced peers who conform to popular discourse on gender so they “do not step on people’s toes,” adding that she thinks it is “cowardly and insincere” of those who do.
The essay refers to Genesis, the first book of the Bible, in which God created men and women, and says that women are intended to be men’s helpers. She defined the Hebrew translation of “helper” — “ezer kenegdo” — as “helper equal to [man],” making the point that God did not make women subordinate to men.
“Society [is] pushing the lie that there are multiple genders and everyone should be whatever they want to be is demonic and severely harms American youth,” the essay continued. “I do not want kids to be teased or bullied in school. However, pushing the lie that everyone has their own truth and everyone can do whatever they want and be whoever they want is not biblical whatsoever.”
“Overall, reading articles such as this one encourage me to one day raise my children knowing that they have a Heavenly Father who loves them and cherishes them deeply and that having their identity firmly rooted in who He is will give them the satisfaction and acceptance that the world can never provide for them,” the essay concludes.
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The grading rubric for the assignment indicates three criteria.
“Does the paper show a clear tie-in to the assigned article?” is the first, worth up to 10 out of the assignment’s 25 total points.
“Does the paper present a thoughtful reaction or response to the article, rather than a summary?” is the second, also worth up to 10 points.
“Is the paper clearly written?” is the last criterion, worth up to five points.
The paper was graded by graduate teaching assistant Mel Curth, who uses she/they pronouns.
The teaching assistant gave Fulnecky a zero out of 25, along with an earful about “empathy” and evidence.
“And so then, about a week later, I received a zero on it from the teaching assistant, and he left submission comments saying that my work was offensive, that I need more empathy in my writing, things like if I’m going to argue against the consensus of every medical field. In every medical association in the United States, then I need empirical evidence to back that,” she said.
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Curth’s response insisted that the grade had nothing to do with Fulnecky’s beliefs, but criticized the essay for lacking empirical evidence, which was not mentioned as a requirement in the grading rubric. Curth also described the paper as “offensive.”
“Please note that I am not deducting points because you have certain beliefs, but instead I am deducting point [sic] for you posting a reaction paper that 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,” Curth’s response said.
Curth said that the concept of only two sexes is not backed by science.
“You may personally disagree with this, but that doesn’t change the fact that every major psychological, medical, pediatric, and psychiatric association in the United States acknowledges that, biologically and psychologically, sex and gender is neither binary nor fixed,” Curth said.
The teaching assistant also found Fulnecky’s use of the word “demonic” to describe the idea of sex and gender on a spectrum “highly offensive.”
“Additionally, to call an entire group of people ‘demonic’ is highly offensive, especially a minoritized population,” Curth said.
“I definitely think that I was being punished for what I believe because I very clearly stated in my essay in my response to the article, I very clearly stated my beliefs and stated what — not just my beliefs — but what the Bible and what God says about gender and about those roles,” Fulnecky said.
Fulnecky told Fox News Digital that when she challenged Curth on the grade, noting that the assignment directed her to provide her own subjective opinion on the article, the teaching assistant doubled down on the zero grade.
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Fulnecky then escalated to the school’s administration.
The university released a statement on social media on Sunday after Fulnecky’s story went viral on social media.
“The University of Oklahoma takes seriously concerns involving First Amendment rights, certainly including religious freedoms,” the statement said. “Upon receiving notice from the student on the grading of an assignment, the University immediately began a full review of the situation and has acted swiftly to address the matter.”
The school said it “acted immediately to address the academic issue raised by the student. College leaders contacted her on the day her letter was received and have maintained regular communication throughout the process.”
“As previously stated, a formal grade appeals process was conducted,” the statement said. “The process resulted in steps to ensure no academic harm to the student from the graded assignments.”
The university also announced that Curth has been placed on administrative leave.
“The graduate student instructor has been placed on administrative leave pending the finalization of this process,” said the statement. “To ensure fairness in the process, a full-time professor is serving as the course instructor for the remainder of the semester.”
Fulnecky, who said she doesn’t believe conservative opinions are well-tolerated at the school, disagreed with Oklahoma’s characterization of its own response, and said she found out about the action taken by the school from the social media post.
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“So, the university is claiming that they’ve been in communication with me and that they gave me some sense of assurance that they wouldn’t let this happen again,” she said. “But in reality, I had no idea. I didn’t think they were going to do anything about the situation. And I honestly don’t think they would have if it hadn’t blown up on social media the way it did. I really was shocked to see that the university put out a statement about that saying that they have handled everything perfectly and trying to cover their tracks because they wouldn’t have done that or even acted like they cared if it hadn’t blown up like it did.”
Ryan Walters is the former Oklahoma superintendent of public instruction, who now runs the Teacher Freedom Alliance.
“Higher Ed. and K-12 schools, under the thumb of teachers unions, have infected an entire generation with their woke anti-Christian bias,” he told Fox News Digital.
“Samantha Fulnecky is an American hero,” he said. “She stood firm in her faith despite the radical attacks from the Marxist professors at the University of Oklahoma. The OU staff involved should be immediately fired and OU should not be receiving taxpayer dollars if they continue their assaults on faith. The war on Christianity is real, and we will not be silenced.”
Fulnecky told Fox News Digital that she has received messages of encouragement and admiration from fellow students for standing up for her beliefs, but has also received hateful messages online.
She encouraged other students to stand up for what they believe.
“It can be pretty scary, but Jesus is always worth standing up for, and I just encourage those people that are dealing with something similar to push back against that kind of behavior and really fight for your university to change, because if we don’t speak up about it, they’re not gonna do anything to change it.”
“I mean, I would rather have my integrity and give my true opinion and get a zero on an assignment than have to lie about what I really believe,” she said.
As for her message to Curth, Fulnecky said God loves the teaching assistant despite the grade.
“I think I would just say that God loves him and that I am saddened that they’re offended by the truth of the gospel and the truth that I wrote about in my assignment, and it saddens me to see that that offends them and upsets them the way it did.”
Neither Curth nor the University of Oklahoma returned requests for comment.
