Submit an Academic Petition or Appeal

Petition Letter: Dear Associate Dean (Academic),

I am writing to petition to late drop CLST 205, ARTF 101, FILM 260, WRIT 125, FILM 236, and ENGL 281, which are courses that I took in the summer 2022 and fall 2022 terms. My request comes as a result of unforeseen personal events that have significantly affected my academic performance.
To give some background to help you understand my academic history, I was identified as gifted with a learning disability in grade 4. Thanks to helpful teachers I achieved mostly As throughout elementary and high school. It wasn??t until grade 12, when teachers were providing less support that I struggled to manage my workload leading to diagnoses of Autism Spectrum Disorder and ADHD inattentive presentation. Unfortunately, just as I qualified to receive some executive skills training, my school shut down for the pandemic.
I started my degree through Queen??s Arts & Science online and managed to pass my courses with accommodations for extra time and extensions. At the time it wasn??t clear to me that I would benefit from learning study skills and strategies or from medication because I had done well in high school with unofficial supports (kind teachers) and I was managing to pass my Queen??s courses, though with lower marks than I??d achieved at high school, which I believed was a common pattern.
My difficulties became overwhelming with my new crop of summer courses this past summer. Firstly, they were structured differently than the Psychology courses I had become familiar with. Whereas the psychology courses tended to require a consistent output of work, with weekly quizzes, I now faced a much wider range of new expectations from week to week requiring prioritization (a skill I was always weak in).
However, my real anxiety started the first time I failed to hand in an assignment by the extension deadline. This happened during my first summer course. This new experience of falling behind in school was the start of a downward spiral. My perception of myself as a gifted student left me unprepared for failure. This novel experience combined with my natural anxiety around novelty now sent my anxiety through the roof. I was too anxious even to ask for help and avoided looking at my grades. The logical steps to fix this situation were not apparent to me. This was a new experience and a new level of anxiety for me.
It wasn't until my mother needed my proof of enrollment in January that I even looked at my marks. Once I told my mother about my failing grades, we started addressing my anxiety and putting supports in place.

In terms of my future plan, I am committed to taking the necessary steps to manage my anxiety and ensure that I have the resources necessary to succeed in my future studies. I have had an initial appointment with my family physician to discuss ADHD medication options and will be following up next week. I have set up weekly accountability meetings with my stepfather. He is helping to teach me to look at everything in the immediate and short term future and create a plan to prioritize the most important tasks. Additionally, I have started bi weekly appointments with a counsellor who specializes in counselling neurodivergent people, and I plan to continue seeing them on a regular basis. I have started practicing mindfulness exercises to help with my anxiety, and have found some relief through them. As another minor adjustment, I plan to take more psychology courses and to review the course expectations when choosing electives, knowing that I prefer courses with regular, smaller assignments.

I recognize that my extenuating circumstances do not guarantee a successful petition, but I am committed to taking the necessary steps to ensure that I am able to succeed academically moving forward. Moreover, this whole experience has taught me that problems only get bigger when ignored, and that I should reach out for help when I am struggling.
Thank you for your time and consideration.

Sincerely,
Gavin Larmet