Submit an Academic Petition or Appeal

Petition Letter: Dear Associate Dean,
I am appealing to drop HIST 245 (Fall 2020) past the academic deadline due to extenuating circumstances. I am a second-year student with a major in Economics and a minor in History. The reason for the appeal is a multitude of issues that affected my performance in this course, which in-turn led to my failure to pass the course achieving a grade of 47.8. Firstly, I have been dealing which legal matters in my personal life which has heightened my stress levels greatly, and during the period of August to December, I have been in sessions with a psychologist to help me deal with the anxiety I have been expiring from this. Furthermore, I am taking a math course which is a weak point for me academically and has become a focus for me to do well in that course as it is a requirement for my major. History has always been a good subject for me, and my anxiety over the Math workload created a situation where I could not focus on history as Math requires me to focus a great deal on. I have been working with my psychologist during sessions in an effort to better handle the situation and create a plan in which allows me to succeed in all areas of my study. The revised academic arrangements with less formal structure due to COVID protocols have been particularly stressful and challenging for me. I am uncomfortable with the online format without direct structure and interaction with both fellow students and the professor. Furthermore, as I am in my second year, I have moved into a house and these shared living arrangements which have added to my anxiety since I have been troubled with the adjustment from a residence with a single room to the noisier environment. I point out that History is the only course I am proposing to appeal to, as it was the course impacted by my anxiety over the new math course and other stresses in my life at the time. History was one of my strongest grades in my first year as I could spend the time working on it and enjoyed it so much that I am minoring in it. However, with the anxiety, I was feeling as I fell behind in the course due to my focus on my math workload, planned on dropping it once I saw this happening. I felt however a very apparent stigma around dropping a course, a stigma which only increased my anxiety about this situation. I felt that maybe I could push through and salvage my grade however that was not the case. My future plan is to take a History course in Summer 2021 so that my third year is not impacted, and I can continue with the planned academic calendar of my degree. I am also having my psychologist draft a letter of reference for this appeal, as we have worked over many issues described over the last term.