MURRAY LIBRARY — Taking inspiration from a network event that took many Facebook users off guard earlier this week, one student at the University of Saskatchewan is planning to defer due dates this term with a similar “out of order” response to inquiries.

Most users who experienced a Facebook outage on Nov. 20 reported seeing an error message stating, “Sorry, something went wrong. We’re working on it, and we’ll get it fixed as soon as we can,” when they attempted to open the site.

Carmen Martins — a sixth-year international studies student who says that DegreeWorks posits that she is, at present, 54 per cent complete her four-year bachelor’s degree — has employed a similar technique to deter nagging professors as the fall academic term continues toward finals at the U of S.

“Look, I’ve just got a lot going on — there’s not enough time in a day to get things done,” Martins said. “I figured I could buy myself some time with this, because at this point, I’m running out of family members to bury.”

Martins says that her default response to emails from professors is nearly word-for-word the same as Facebook’s error message. She says that the social-
media network’s outage provided her with more than just a viable delay tactic — she found a deeper meaning that she says has altered her own values.

“It’s like, sometimes things just can’t happen, and you have to get on and deal with it — nothing in this life is a guarantee,” Martins said.

Martins’ professors declined to comment in the interest of maintaining student privacy, but there is little evidence in any of her current class syllabi to suggest that her strategy might be effective in ensuring a passing grade.