Submit an Academic Petition or Appeal

Petition Letter: To the Associate Dean (academic):

I am appealing to drop POLS 367 (2020, Fall).

I have been diagnosed with severe anxiety at the start of the term and have been able to manage it, for the most part, up until recently. I did not anticipate that the heavy workload would have such a negative impact on my mental health and my ability to deal with my anxiety ¿¿ as I have been able to manage it in the past. After midterms I noticed that my anxiety was worsening and most days I wasn¿¿t able to complete my coursework. I began to fall behind in most of my courses and have struggled to keep up since then. As of right now, I have fallen very behind on lectures and stressful assignments, particularly in POLS 367, making it even more difficult to cope with this added anxiety. Extreme stress (coupled with a lack of support system, besides as a psychotherapist) has made this semester extremely difficult for me and increasingly worse as the stress from my assignments has piled on. I have been affected for most of the semester, however, this issue has gotten worse in the passing months and weeks, particularly this past week (November 29th, 2020).

I am looking to appeal only this course as I have been able to (or feel that I will be able to) catch up in my other course. This course has been a point of extreme stress for me and attempting to complete the necessary assignments and receive good marks has caused my mental health to take a nose-dive. Continuing to work on this course and attempting to catch up will have a detrimental effect on my mental health, which I am actively trying to approve. I didn¿¿t drop the course earlier as my anxiety and mental health were in a good place and I felt that I was able to work to complete things, however as the semester has progressed, I have not been able to cope with stress and anxiety, and my schoolwork has suffered. I am unable to complete this work next semester as I have already overloaded my credits, and I feel as though (based on how this semester has gone) it will be too much for me to handle.

As of right now (and in the past few weeks) I am attending therapy and taking medication to try and resolve my anxiety, however it has not worked to completely resolve the issue and the stress from schoolwork is making it even more difficult to manage. I feel that when I find the right treatment plan, I will be once again able to cope with the stress of University coursework. If I continue with treatment, I feel that the issue will be manageable, and if it is not, I plan to take a lighter course load in the future. I also plan to reduce my course load next semester because, as of right now, I have overloaded my credits. I hope that reducing the number of credits I am taking will help me combat my chronic stress and anxiety.

Grace McMullan
20100085