Wish I hadn't given Straighterline my money

[Merlin]

In today's episode of Straighterline English, we have the most uninvolved and unconcerned grader to have graded a paper thus far. 

*long sigh* So my persuasive draft was returned with the "instructor's" (some YA college tutor) feedback. I was so surprised to see that he hasn't read any of the Straighterline guidelines for their standard formatting. You literally cannot miss the rules unless you refuse to read any of the given material on how your paper will be graded. Both the assignment instructions, the sample essays, and even the page you access to open an assignment EXPLICITLY explains their rules and how to follow them. 

The very first edit this guy made on my paper was one that informs me to NOT use the Straighterline formatting. Needless to say, I'm not going to comply with his suggestion, as he isn't in authority here -- though he seems to think he is, as he has no concern for what SL demands from the student.  

I'm just lead to wonder how in the world these people get hired to work for SL when they know so little about the company/their rules. I'm concerned about this same guy giving me the final grade, because he'll see that I didn't change the format, and base the grade off of that. 

You never know what you're going to get with this course. There's no such thing as consistency when it comes to the SL English Composition courses (this does not include the teacher-led version as I haven't tried that one).

Yeah, the SmartThinking tutors who grade the regular course papers kind of suck. They are all over the place and they don't respect the rubric or the posted formatting requirements.

I also took the non-teacher led version (originally) and got frustrated. As I recall, the tutors even marked me down for underlining the thesis and such as required by the rubric. When Straighterline added the teacher-led version, I canceled and jumped over to that and it was like night and day.

Keep in mind that this was in 2011 before Study.com was an option, I'd probably have dropped SL and switched to Study.com had that been an option. At the time it was either SL or CLEP, and I didn't think I could do the essays quick enough during the CLEP.

If you were me, would you contact student support? I don't want to risk this guy getting an attitude and grading low if I don't revise my paper how he said to. I mean, as you already said, it's in the rubric. Am I supposed to disregard the rubric all for this one tutor?

You get a different tutor each time you submit a paper for grading, so chances are you won't get the same one twice. Or if you do, you won't know ahead of time. There is also no way to really coordinate or communicate with the random graders either, so its hard to really create a sense of expectation if and when to follow or not follow the rubric. How can you even be sure you're learning the correct material if the grader contradicts the rubric and curriculum? IMO, it isn't the graders' job to tell you to do things differen't, they should just follow the rubric and not add their own interpretation. Yes, in the real college world things are done differently than how SL teaches it, but most teachers have their own rubric anyway... the rule is to always follow the rubric.

If it were me, I'd do what I did the first time and drop this version of the course, get a refund and use it to get the teacher-led version so you can get consistent teaching, someone to speak to about questions, and assurance that the grading will follow the rubric. If you're unwilling to do that, then I'd just stick to the rubric and complain to student support that your graders aren't following the published course rubric. Just be prepared to show examples where the graders aren't following the rules or telling you to avoid the curriculum.