Submit an Academic Petition or Appeal

Petition Letter: To the Associate Dean


//I am writing this appeal to defer to your better judgement about three courses I had failed in the Fall Term of 2015-2016. These courses are Econ 255, Econ 390, and Phil 347. I realize, two year after the fact, my appeal may appear opportunistic and insincere. However, given the nature of my reason for those failures and my subsequent recovery and rehabilitation from the condition that caused my failures, I hope that you may come to agree with me that those grades are not representative of my abilities as a student and that my failure to submit a timely appeal was an oversight caused likewise by my illness.


//As medical documentation from my doctor will show, I began on a sharp downward trajectory in mood and overall mental constitution in November of 2015. Email records to and from my doctor during this time confirm this rapid deterioration from an above-average student earlier in the semester to a non-functional wreck. My illness, bipolar disorder, had been temporarily treated but not adequately so. As exams approached, I grew increasingly depressed and paranoid, going so far as to hide knives in my room and brooding for days in my room, not eating, leaving only to use the bathroom. Perhaps the fact that my illness had caused a delay in my academic progress, coupled with seeing many of my friends graduate while I still needed many more semesters before I could even think about graduation, brought on this depression. This was coupled with the conviction that nothing I did was good enough, that my previous manic episode had left me brain damaged, and that, try as I might, I will fail all my courses. Everything seemed hopeless at that point.


//During this time I brought myself to attend my first exam, for Urban Economics. Leaving the exam hall I was convinced that I had failed. A wave of regret washed over me, and I knew if I repeated this process for all my other courses, that I would eventually reach a state where I would be a danger to myself or others. I attempted to study, but the fatalistic conviction that, regardless of what I do, that I will fail no matter what, led me to the conclusion that if I continued on like this I would not live to see the New Year. With the advice of my doctor and my parents, I withdrew for the winter semester of 2016 and returned home to focus on treatment. To underscore the fatalistic insanity at the time, the one exam I attended, the exam that precipitated my withdrawal from undergraduate studies, the exam I was convinced I had failed, that exam earned me my first A+ in an upper year course.


//During my time off I focused on getting adequate treatment for my illness which paid off in the semesters that came afterwards in the form of consistent As in every class except for one B+. I did not appeal these grades earlier because in my anxiety I felt I needed to prove first and foremost that I am not an invalid as my mental illness made me fear, that I do indeed have the ability to get high grades, that there was no overarching reason why I must fail every course I take. I saw it as a point of honour that I must show these traits, if the assertion, that these grades are not representative of my abilities, were to be plausible. Much anxiety precipitated this decision as my transcript relied on it, and I was not confident my appeal would be approved in the absence of such proof that this was an aberration, not the norm. Given that by the time my illness adequately abated I was well past the deadline, I thought the better way to show that I really deserved these appeals would be to show that these grades are not at all representative of my abilities. It required medication and a lot of therapy, but I was able to return a successful student and have already retaken one of the courses I had failed, for which I received an A.


//Medical documentation which will be delivered by the end of this week will show that my illness had reached a critical, potentially mortal phase; some studies estimate that over 20 of people with bipolar disorder will eventually die of suicide, so the assertion that I was on the brink of death is not an exaggeration. I was fully ready to end my life because I had believed I had failed a course in which I received the highest grade possible. This insanity is not representative of who I am, of what my potential is, of what I deserve in an academic sense. In fact for one of the courses whose exam I did not attend, Econ 390, I was doing exceptionally well in class and was even tutoring one of my friends who was in the same class. The fact that I could think I were better off not attending underscores just how insane I was during the period in question. The fact that my illness only got better when taking antipsychotics when I returned in September shows that I was still ill by May and unable to make the deadline by which I needed to appeal my grades. After that period, I felt if my appeal would be taken seriously I needed to prove that these grades were not representative of my academic abilities. It was a function of my lingering anxiety that led me to this belief, and thus I believe it qualifies as a continuing illness that prevented me from filing this appeal in a more timely manner.


//I hope that you may see that my assertion that I was medically unwell during this time, that these failures are not representative of my abilities, and that I could not have appealed earlier, have merit. All that I desire is that my transcript accurately reflects my abilities unhindered by periods when I really ought to have been at home recovering. I concede that it is my fault that I entered my fourth year without having been adequately treated in my illness, and that my summer schooling grade of a D in statistics should have shown that I was not ready to return to class. However, for most of the fall term I was in a functional state; I was not doing phenomenally as I have been doing since returning from my withdrawal, but I was getting by until November's depression washed over me like a wave. It was an unprecedented development that, in retrospect, could not have been avoided. Records will show that I tried several different medications during this time to curb my depression, to no effect. It was only after returning from my withdrawal in September that I saw adequate recovery from my illness. This was well after the deadline for appeals, and I felt I thus needed to show that this period was an aberration, not the norm, if any appeal were to be taken seriously.


//I sincerely hope that you may agree with me, given my illness at the time and my subsequent successful academic career, that the grades during this period was not representative of my abilities and were, more than anything, functions of my illness. The reason why I was unable to submit an appeal earlier was because I was still recovering at the time and did not adequately recover until September of 2016, past the appeal deadline for the fall term of 2015. I was unsure during my recovery whether I would even return to school, so an appeal was the last thing on my mind. In retrospect this was a very big mistake on my part and I apologize profusely. The fact that my illness went on until September of 2016 shows that I was not in the right frame of mind to submit an appeal until well after the due date, and subsequent to that I felt, through anxiety, that I needed to show that I was not just filing an opportunistic appeal, that these grades really are not representative of my abilities, and thus felt I needed to show that I was an exceptional student with an illness that hindered my abilities during that time before filing any appeal.


//Thank you for your consideration and your time. I hope that you may agree with me that these grades are not representative of my illness, and that my ongoing illness prevented me from filing a timely appeal. I hope you may rectify my transcript to be an accurate reflection of my abilities and not the failures of a once-deranged man. I hope with this appeal I may put the past behind me and focus on my new, healthy, successful life.