Submit an Academic Petition or Appeal

Petition Letter: Sebastian Zarazua
20054835
May 28th, 2018

To the Associate Dean of Studies,

My name is Sebastian Zarazua and I am appealing to drop MATH 121B (Fall/Winter, 2017) as well as appealing for credit standing in PHYS 117 (Fall/Winter, 2017). The reason for this request is because I suffered from alcohol addiction throughout my first year of studies. This negatively impacted my studies as it inhibited my learning, as well as decreased my overall productivity and drive to study because of this abuse.
The addiction to alcohol began shortly after Frosh Week, as I had newly been introduced to alcohol at university. Prior to this, I had been a competitive athlete at the provincial level and had never really partied or consumed alcohol as per a contract that I had signed. During Frosh Week I tried alcohol for the first time and was overwhelmed by the way it changed my experience, in addition to all the partying that was occurring. From that point onwards, I would consume alcohol daily because of the way it made me feel, despite the fact that I had classes to attend and other responsibilities to fulfill. I was constantly intoxicated, and thus would frequently miss classes and labs in my courses. It also impacted my individual studies because I was often too intoxicated to even know that I had individual work do, much less complete it. Following a night that my friends had to take me to Kingston General Hospital via ambulance in late January because of my alcohol abuse, I realized that I had to turn things around. Unfortunately, that realization came too late as my grades had already severely suffered from first semester. Throughout the course of the second semester, I struggled with my addiction, sometimes failing to stay sober during this time. I was ashamed of what I had done and tried to deal with it on my own, rather than appropriately using the resources and support systems available to me through the university and through my friends. During this period of struggle, it was a vicious cycle of not falling back into my addiction and fighting to pull my grades up. I believed that I couldn¿¿t drop any of my courses because I needed them and the credits to enter the Life Science major, which is my goal for second year. I tried to pull my grades up in order to pass and started working with a tutor in mid-February for Math and Physics. This was sufficient to barely pass Physics but unfortunately was not sufficient for Math, which I failed. These courses were the courses most impacted by my addiction because I had already done IB Biology and Chemistry in high school, but had never done Physics and struggled with Math in high school. Having already seen some of the material for these courses in IB, I could somewhat coast by with the knowledge I already had in Biology and Chemistry. As I said above, I also did not choose to drop these courses earlier because I believed that I needed them to enter my proposed course of study and that I could pull my marks up enough to pass them.
Going forward, I have taken the necessary steps to ensure that this does not occur again. I have stopped drinking since my return home with the assistance of medical professionals, and I have secured full time summer employment through the Canada Student jobs program at the Brain Injury Community Re-Entry in Thorold, Ontario. I am currently searching for a counsellor through my father¿¿s work EAP in order to create a strategy to continue refraining from drinking. In the coming year, I plan to retake Math 121B to achieve a grade that better reflects my abilities. Upon my return to Queen¿¿s University, I plan to seek out a counsellor in Kingston so that I may continue treatment throughout the year, as alcohol will be present all throughout university and I want to ensure that I am not tempted to fall into addiction again. I will also continue to receive tutoring and access university resources & supports for continued academic improvement. This experience has taught me the importance of continued discipline and that academic success in each year is vital to achieving my personal goals. These plans support my goals of obtaining better grades and staying addiction-free by using the steps outlined above. Given the contents of this letter, I hope that you can grant me my appeal to drop MATH 121B (Fall/Winter, 2017) and grant my appeal for credit standing in PHYS 117 (Fall/Winter, 2017) so that I may continue my academic career at Queen¿¿s University in Life Sciences.

Sincerely,
Sebastian Zarazua