Submit an Academic Petition or Appeal

Petition Letter: Petition for Credit Standing
November 7th, 2023
Associate Dean (Academic), Faculty of Arts and Science
Dunning Hall - First Floor, Queen’s University
94 University Ave,
Kingston, ON
K7L 3N6

To whom it may concern,
My name is Sarah Steadman. I am a Queen’s student in my third year in Concurrent Education, majoring in Psychology. I am petitioning for credit standing for two of my courses in the Fall semester of 2022, PSYC202 Statistics In Psychology and PSYC251 Developmental Psychology. My grades in these courses are not an accurate representation of my academic capabilities and are a result of extenuating circumstances of the time.
In June of 2022 my father passed away suddenly. It was on the heels of a fight he had with my mother the same day. He had a history of smoking (tobacco and cannabis), unhealthy binge-restrict eating habits, and a family history of heart disease. He also had a tendency to become very angry, very quickly, over a seemingly small issue.
All my life, we walked on eggshells, if we strayed too far from my father’s wishes, there was a good chance of it resulting in a fight. June 26th was the worst I had ever seen. I had been out all day with friends. I returned home and my father was in the basement, where he would regularly hide away after larger fights, coming up at night to get food, have a smoke, and slam some doors and cabinets on his way. This was a semi-regular occurrence throughout my life. Generally, we would give him his space, and after a couple of days he would return to our world like nothing had happened. This time was different. The evening of the 26th he came back upstairs a couple of times to rehash the same fight with my mom. I listened from upstairs as he screamed insults, swung a bench in our foyer, and slammed the basement door hard enough, enough times that the door frame broke off of the wall. My mom rarely fought back, at least not like him. He never laid a hand on her, but his voice and damage to our home was enough. After he returned to the basement, the next few days played out differently than they typically did. He was quiet. Another day went by and we let him be. But he was still quiet. My mom, brother and I all remarked on it. The terrifying thought lingered, until June 29th, when we decided my brother and I should go downstairs with water and a snack. We called out to him. Nothing. Louder. Nothing. I screamed his name and he didn’t move. He had suffered a heart attack, what we assume had been about 48 hours prior based on the state of his body. I had never seen anything like it and I hope I never do again. He had foamed at the mouth, his body veiny and decrepit. I went to my basement with my brother that day and found my father’s two day decomposed corpse. My mom followed suit as she called 911. When they got to our home they reassured us that we could not have done anything differently and that we were simply following a pattern that he had built. The rest of the day, week, month, my family was in a state of shock.
I carried on that way for a while. In denial of my own grief and trauma. As complicated and abusive as my father could be, it is important to also acknowledge how incredible of a man and father he was when he wasn’t angry. I often considered him my best friend. So while I worked through the trauma of that weekend, I also had to process the grief of losing one of my favourite people, the grief of losing my father.
I didn’t start therapy until about 2 months after it happened. I wasn’t sure there was anything a therapist could tell me that I didn’t already know. I was wrong. Starting therapy changed everything for me. But it wasn’t until December, about six months after the loss, that I began to feel like myself again. Even then, it was a gradual process. I sought out accommodations through Student Wellness for the better half of the winter 2023 semester and it was so incredibly helpful. If I experienced a flashback during an exam, I had the time and quiet space to work through it properly. If I experienced a difficult night of grief right before an essay was due, I could get an extension and give grief the time it deserved. Those accommodations were temporary, but were exactly what I needed. I wish I gave myself the allowance to seek them out in the first semester, as opposed to attempting to fight through the hardest 6 months of my life without any help. Now, nearly a year and a half has passed, and I look back at the girl who tried so desperately to be okay for those first six months, and I wish I gave her the patience and grace that she deserved. Despite my improvement, as I wrote the better part of this letter, my hands were shaking and tears brimmed my eyes, evidence that if I am still viscerally affected by this now, the impact on my life that it held a year ago was all that much more significant.
With the encouragement of Dr. Meghan Norris, I am petitioning for credit standing now. I graduated high school with a 96 average, student council president, and valedictorian and while high school was now almost 3 full years ago, I also finished first year with a 3.75 GPA and I know that my lowest grades from the first semester of second year were an inaccurate representation of what I am capable of. It hurts to see my GPA reflect a version of myself that I know is not true to who I am. I am already seeing a massive improvement in my motivation, commitment and determination to school in my third year and I sincerely hope you understand my interest in this petition. Thank you for taking the time to read this letter and consider my position.
Sincerely,
Sarah Steadman