Submit an Academic Petition or Appeal

Petition Letter: Queen¿¿s Academic Appeal
Hannah Ross
20030055


Dear Associate Dean of Studies and those this may concern,

My name is Hannah Ross and I am a fourth year undergraduate biology student here at Queen¿¿s. In the fall of 2019, I was dealing with personal health issues which resulted in me missing several weeks of the fall semester. I was incapable of completing school work, underwent surgery, was very ill and dealing with mental health challenges as a result. At the advice of Sarah Bunting, I am writing to apply for Aggregate Standing in my fall term courses as it has been nearly a year since I have worked on the material (CHEM281, BIOL330 & BIOL350), should this not be approved I would like to apply for an extension to the IN to be completed by the end of the fall term. I would also like to appeal my grade in a fall term course (BIOL300). It is my hope that I will be able to finish these courses given that I did not have the opportunity to during the IN term this summer.

Outstanding work:
¿¿ CHEM281 Final Exam
¿¿ BIOL330 Final Assignment and Exam
¿¿ BIOL 350 Final Exam

During the exam period I was unable to write my final exams for each of the classes. I provided the required documentation for missing the exams and was approved to write the make up exams. By the time the makeup exams came around in early January, I was not well enough to write them. I provided documentation for the professors who required documentation to miss the makeup exam, while others were okay with writing it at any point before the end of the IN term (end of April). I received an email from the faculty that the university was extending IN grades due to COVID, if the instructors approved it, and so I reached out to them.

CHEM281: Professor asked me to file an appeal with the university to have the IN extended. I reached out to considerations to see what the next steps were, and they let me know that I did not need to file an appeal and that all IN were extended. I forwarded this email to my prof and asked how he wanted to go about me finishing the course in mid-May. After not receiving a reply for several weeks, I followed up with him again on July 31st and he responded to me very quickly saying that he was not offering a CHEM281 exam until December. I was hoping to start this semester off fresh without courses incomplete and so I reached out to Sarah Bunting at Arts and Science considerations to see if my professor was allowed to just not offer me an exam during the term of my IN. I spoke with Sarah Bunting and she let me know that I may be able to submit an AG since it has been almost a year since I have worked with the content in class and the professor did not offer me an option of completing the course this summer.

BIOL330: Professor told me that I could complete the outstanding assignment and exam in the fall term.

BIOL350: This course I actually passed without writing the 50 final, because I got a bonus 5 on an extra assignment. I received a D- in the course as the final exam had a zero and the professor did not change it to an incomplete even though the proper documentation was provided. I reached out to Sarah Bunting who helped me to speak with my professor about arranging an exam date over the summer. I was provided with 3 dates to choose from, I emailed on July 31st to select August 11th and the professor said that he was no longer available and that I should reach out to Sarah Bunting to see what my options were. Sarah bunting told me that it may be an option to apply for aggregate standing in the course seeing as I did so well in the course that I was able to pass without writing a 50 exam. Seeing as it has been a year since I worked with this content in class.

BIOL300 I missed two small evaluations for this course (a 5 multiple choice question open book online reading quiz 13 worth 1 and an in class pop quiz 9 worth 3.5 which I missed because I was in surgery) which I provided documentation for and was excused from. I calculated my final mark to be 87 but only received a final grade of 83. It is my belief that the evaluations that I was excused from were not adjusted for when calculating my final grade in the course. I have been in communication with both of the professors for this class (Laura Nagel and Paul Martin) since January to sort this out. I received a response from Dr. Nagel in early May with a screenshot of my mark breakdown. As predicted my recorded marks were listed as 0 for reading quiz 13 and pop quiz 9. I responded to her providing the documentation for those missing assignments on May 22nd and followed up on June 4, July 31st. On August 13th, I spoke with Sarah Bunting and had her help me with reaching out to these professors about my grade and she sent them an email. On September 11th, I sent another email to my profs asking for an update and have still not heard anything back.

I will be providing all documentation shortly, please feel free to email or call me to inquire on any additional information you may need to help come to a resolution. I am very much hoping to finish these courses. Should AG not be possible, I would very much hope to extend my incompletes. I am in much better health and well supported at this time.

Thank you for your time and consideration,
Hannah Ross