Submit an Academic Petition or Appeal

Petition Letter: Dear Associate Dean,

I am writing to request to add courses after the academic deadline. For almost two years I have been struggling with debilitating anxiety that has severely affected my academic performance.

When I reached a very low point last year in my second semester at Queen's I had sought help at Student Wellness Services and started seeing a counselor. This had helped me get through the rest of the year and after that I continued counseling so that I could learn how to better manage my anxiety and mitigate the effects it has had on my academics and other areas of my life as well as create a support system at Queen's and a stronger network of support with my family and friends.

While I have seen improvements in how I handled my academics since seeking help, I was unfortunately still poorly performing academically last semester even after deciding to reduce my course load to nine credits. As a result of this as well as failing to advance in my academic plan after almost two years, I had decided that the best course of action to take was to change it and thus completely altering the career path I'll take after graduation. I planned to take only electives this semester and then take the required first year prerequisites in the next academic year. Though I know that this is the course of action, I was making the choice to change a career plan I had decided to pursue years ago and the decision to take such a drastic change had taken a greater mental toll than expected. Because of this I was continually postponing course registration and missed the academic deadline. Due to these events I had gone to see a crisis counselor who had helped me get back on the right track. My next appointment with my regular counselor is next week and my focus this semester is to see her as often as I can so that I can stay on the right track and end this year strong. Because availabilities in her schedule can at times not come up for as long as three weeks, I plan to call counseling services every couple of days to check if there had been any cancellations in her schedule so that I can keep appointments as close together as possible. I will also be taking a reduced course load this semester as well.

Thank you for taking the time to read this and consider my request.

Sincerely,
Anushia Perera