Submit an Academic Petition or Appeal

Appeal Letter: Dear to whom it may concern, I am writing this letter to appeal the decision made to deny my late drop request as of August 2023, The decision I believe is wildly inaccurate with the points made and position taken, and all these results have resulted in a tremendous amount of stress and concern for me. This summer has been extremely hard on me through dealing with illness, family trauma, physical injury, mental illness, and technical issues resulting from these circumstances. I tore a tendon in my finger to begin the summer, and this has affected me through the whole summer as well I have been dealing with family issues stemming from finical as well as personal trauma that has caused me to be effectively estranged from my family which has caused much mental anguish and struggle. Throughout the summer, I was unable to access the internet at my house due to the bill being overdue, as a result of me being left by my housemates to foot the entire bill by myself, which not only added to my anxiety and stress it also made me unable to complete my school work on time due to working full time and being unable to access the internet in my time at home to complete the assignments in Engl 215. While attempting throughout the whole summer, to complete this course on time and with good academic standing. While dealing with all of these extenuating circumstances, they started to significantly affect my ability to perform academically at a standard that is up to the university standard. I attempted the whole summer to put myself mentally in a position to be successful in this class. By attending the public as well as school librarys as much as I can in my small amount of free time as I had a full time job throughout the summer to support myself, which is corroborated by the supporting documents that I have attached and submitted to this appeal. While I understand the rule that before week 7, I need to evaluate and drop the course, I am a student who relies on financial aid to support me through school and have no financial support from family and those around me; therefore, due to my reliance on OSAP to make my way through school, and due to this fact felt unbelievable stress to complete this course to make sure I was able to keep my financial aid. I improperly chose to continue the class. It was only after weeks of discussion and deciding with my therapist, as well as asking the professor what the best course of action for myself, that we finally decided that with proper documentation, the proper course of action. Even with the financial penalty that would occur from OSAP, as the stress from the course as well as from all the financial issues were starting to take a toll on my health, causing much stress and for my chronic stomach issues to return, I understand the rules, and I believe that because of the extenuating mental health issues, it was extenuating enough to be granted the opportunity to drop this course late not to have my academic career tarnished by some of the worst moments of my life that I already had and still have a terrible time while dealing with circumstances and would hate to be punished twice for these moments and how the have affected my academic standing. I also took HIST 252 in the summer, which is currently a failing grade, but after discussions and explanation with the instructor, he was able to allow me to hand in the assignments and boost my grade to a passing mark, I also explored this option with the ENGL 215 instructor however he said he was unable to and advised me himself to late drop the course and attempt again the coming year. The late drop was certainly the last resort as a solution for these issues.
I am a student who works hard academically and athletically and wants to finish my degree in good standing and have had a terrible summer and would not want this to hinder my academics more, and with those reasons in detail, I believe I should be able to drop this course to allow me to continue this academic year not on academic probation by the university as I am hoping to do more than obtain my general degree after this year.