Submit an Academic Petition or Appeal

Petition Letter: Dear Associate Dean,

I am currently enrolled in CISC 271 and I am requesting to write the second quiz of the semester. I had to miss this second quiz, as I was attending a final round interview in Toronto for a full-time position during the time of the quiz (Friday, Feb. 15 from 11:30-12:20). I was unable to change the date and time of my interview. I contacted the head TA of the course as well as the professor two weeks in advance of the date to make alternative arrangements, but I was informed that I was not able to do so. CISC 271 does offer another test at the end of the semester that the professor mentioned, but I was hoping to replace my first quiz with this option instead of the second quiz, as I received a 57 on it as well as a 13 on my first assignment due to some other factors impacting me throughout the semester - this semester in particular has been difficult, as it's been the most busy semester of my university career and there were some external factors impacting me as well.

As a dual degree student, I've been primarily in Commerce courses and this is the first semester where I've had only Computing courses. Last semester I had my last Commerce class as well as primarily math courses in Computing, so suddenly switching to a semester where everything was code-heavy and only Computing was a huge shock for me, given that I found myself without all the resources and support I had developed over the past four years. I've been very unfamiliar with where to go to get help and have struggled in my courses this semester because of this. It's also been extremely stressful for me to ensure that I'm completing all of my dual degree requirements, as I've been planning this since my first year and have constantly had to switch around my courses to ensure that everything works out, given that I've dedicated so much time and additional effort for it through taking more than a full course-load, taking class outside of Queen's, taking summer school classes, and using additional credits. I'm very concerned about passing all of my courses this semester, as I've planned everything so carefully to ensure that I do not waste all the additional time, effort, and money spent.

Additionally, I've been searching for a full-time job, participating in more extracurricular activities, and working out my post-graduation arrangements all semester, which has contributed to more stress. On top of this, I've had many familial issues over the past while - my mother had to quit work last year due to stress and health reasons, and unfortunately, my grandfather passed away as well, leading to my parents having to very last-minute fly back to China. With all these things going on in my family, my factor has also been unwell lately and experiencing issues with his heart and stress - he recently had to visit the emergency room and undergo heart surgery to insert artery stents. He was intending on retiring later after my graduation so that I could be covered while dealing with things like travel insurance and getting my wisdom teeth out, but is now planning on retiring within the next few weeks, which has caused more stress for me to figure things out for myself.

These factors have lead me to missing a lot of class due to visits back home and time spent dealing with these issues - I've always had a lot of stress during my university career, but this semester has definitely been the hardest and it has impacted me since January. I've been feeling extremely overwhelmed and an intense stress to be working 24/7 but also a consequently lack of desire to do anything that I've never experienced before. I've never had a semester where I missed so much class and I've definitely seen it reflected in my academic performance - however, I really want to finish out my university career the same way that I've been doing until now. I would love a new opportunity to write my second quiz for CISC 271 that I missed, so that I can use the alternative option provided to rewrite my first quiz, to ensure that I can pass the course. My performance in this course has literally been on my mind all the time, and I thought that there was no way for me to pull it back together; however, I was recently informed by an old high school friend that a friend of his in this class has also still yet to write the second quiz due to personal circumstances, so I was hoping to join him in that. This would really help me reduce my stress and worries for this semester - thank you so much for your time and consideration.