phenom
Explanation
This comic is a wordplay joke built on the dual meaning of the word "phenomenal."
In everyday English, "phenomenal" is a superlative compliment meaning "extraordinary" or "outstanding." A professor tells a student, "This was a phenomenal paper, young man. You have a phenomenal mind." The student, confused by the giant "F" on his paper, asks why he did not get "a phenomenal grade." The professor replies, "It's right there, shit-for-brains."
The joke hinges on the technical meaning of "phenomenal" in philosophy of mind, which the caption at the bottom explains: in philosophy, "phenomenal" simply means "appears to exist" or "relates to subjective conscious experience" (as in "phenomenal consciousness" or "qualia"). So when the professor says the paper is "phenomenal," he is not praising it -- he is saying it merely appears to exist, or has only the quality of seeming real. The student's mind is "phenomenal" in the same deflating sense: it merely seems to be there. And the grade "F" is the phenomenal grade -- it is right there on the page.
This is a recurring SMBC format: a philosophy professor (the bearded character who appears across many strips) uses philosophical jargon in a way that sounds like praise but is actually an insult, reflecting the comic's love of academic wordplay and the gap between technical and colloquial language. The insult "shit-for-brains" adds the characteristic SMBC bluntness.