Submit an Academic Petition or Appeal

Petition Letter: I am submitting this petition to waive the grade required on the final exam to obtain the credit for ASTR 101 due to discrepancies in the exam taught by different professors, the grade I achieved on the exam, and other circumstances that contributed to my grade. I took ASTR 101 this past semester with Prof. David A. Hanes. On the syllabus, it is stated that in order to pass this course you must pass the final exam with a minimum grade of 45%. First semester, the ASTR 101 class was taught by Prof. Stéphane Courteau and had a minimum exam grade requirement as well. Nonetheless, based solely on the format of the final exams, that created by Prof. Hanes is seemingly much harder than that by Prof. Courteau. Prof. Hane's exam consisted of 40 multiple choice questions and 60 points worth of short answer questions, whereas Prof. Courteau's exam consisted of 70 multiple choice questions and no short answer questions. While both of these types of questions require knowledge of the subject, multiple-choice questions can be much easier than short answer questions testing the same information because recalling the correct answer on your own is harder than recognizing the correct answer when it is given to you in a multiple choice format. Going into the final exam, I calculated my grade in ASTR 101 to be 85.3%. I received 41.5% on the final exam, theoretically passing the course with 65.9%, but due to the minimum grade of 45% that was required to pass, I did not get the credit for the course. I believe that this requirement for the final exam is an unjust evaluation of one's knowledge of the course material. Additionally, my exam schedule was a contributor to my subpar grade on the exam as I had an exam for PHYS 116 at 9AM the same day as the exam for ASTR 101 that took place at 7PM. I allocated more time to study for the PHYS 116 exam, as I found the work throughout the course much harder to understand than that of ASTR 101. I've never had to write two exams on the same day before so this was a learning experience and challenging for me to navigate. As I fell short by only 3.5%, I would greatly appreciate being awarded the credit for this course as I believe the work I put forth demonstrates sufficient knowledge of the course material.