My last name starts with a letter at the bottom of the alphabet. I notice this all the time. Anecdote from this year: My son is in a high school class that requires constant input from the teacher on long running projects they have. The teacher reviews the projects alphabetically by surname, about 40% of the time, the teacher never gets to the bottom of the class, and asks the students to find her after school if they have issues. But the nature of the projects definitely requires proactive comments from the teacher. I ask my son to go find the teacher regardless and get a pro-active review, but not all the kids do that, and hence the potential for a lower grade.