Over the summer of 1990, Bart's rebellious nature was characterized by some parents and conservatives as a poor role model for children while several American public schools banned T-shirts featuring Bart next to captions such as "I'm Bart Simpson. Who the hell are you?" and "Underachiever ('And proud of it, man!'). "Several critics thought that the episode was a response to these controversies. However, executive producer
James L. Brooks responded that it was not, but added, "we're mindful of it. I do think it's important for us that Bart does badly in school. There are students like that. Besides, I'm very wary of television where everybody is supposed to be a role model. You don't run across that many role models in real life. Why should television be full of them?"
Sam Simon commented that "there are themes to the shows we did last year, important themes, I think it's a tribute to how well we executed them that nobody realized we had a point.