Student crashes out after returning to her grad student cubicle to find her school had thrown away hours of work on her thesis

Imagine putting in hours and hours of work studying for grad school only to have it all undone in a matter of seconds. Well that is exactly the predicament one student on TikTok found herself in after returning to the desk she was renting to find all the work she’d done on her thesis missing.

TikToker Delamites, AKA Del, recorded her stunned reaction as she looked at the empty desk which, the last time she saw it, had been filled with all the work she’d done for her thesis. The life of a grad student is stressful enough but losing all that work would be enough to make anybody throw their hands up and say “I quit.”

Unfortunately it wasn’t just a case of the work being moved by some unknowing member of staff as Del writes in the video caption that her school had thrown away all her work. Why they did this is anybody’s guess.

Comments from viewers saw a mix of sympathy and confusion. One person wrote, “I’m so sorry this happened to you,” whereas others asked why she had left all her work at the desk. In a second video Del explained that these desks were loaned out to grad students to use as their own space and that it was normal and even expected of students to leave their work at the desk.

After a long weekend away from her desk she returned to find the desk empty and her name removed from the cubicle. When she spoke to the resource manager of the library they blamed Del for leaving her work on the desk and told her that they had thrown it away.

What could Del do?

Speaking to the library manager Del was assured that this shouldn’t have happened as the policy is to not touch student’s work. They confirmed that she should have been notified of a desk change and that they should have held on to her work for at least 24 hours. However, the resource manager ignored procedure and did none of these things.

Determined to get her work back Del even asked if she could search through the trash but unfortunately it had already been picked up the day before meaning all hope was lost of getting her thesis back. The manager confirmed to Del that he would contact her thesis advisor to let them know what happened and presumably take responsibility for the incident. Furthermore the manager said that the staff that threw away Del’s work would be spoken to, although they avoided mentioning disciplinary action.

Aside from that there’s not much she can do other than pick herself up and carry on with her work.