Submit an Academic Petition or Appeal

Petition Letter: In the Fall of 2019 I took Psychology 202 and received an F because I failed to drop it when I should have as I always think I can keep going and then realize that I cannot. During this course I became pregnant with my daughter and had a really hard time with doing my work and focusing as I was trying to manage being newly pregnant, symptoms, moving, and school work. As you can see from my transcript my grades that term were not the best as I was struggling with this new life event and was extremely excited but it was a lot with school. I became pregnant in November and found out later that month closer to December which was after the time when I was allowed to drop the course and I was already not doing great in it. I asked the TA and the head advisor of psychology what I should do and was informed that I should just focus on my other courses and retake psychology another year.

I completely comprehend that what I did was incorrect and I should have taken it more seriously and appealed then and really should have dropped the course when I had the chance to do so. However, that is in the past and I have learned from that and will drop courses when I know that they are too much to handle prior to the drop date.

This summer I will be taking STAM 200 which is an equivalent course to STATS 200. I believe that with hard work, focus and determination I will be able to get a good grade in this course. I am heading into my fourth year and understand that I can retake psych 202 in the Fall but I prefer to get it over with in the Summer since my partner is taking weekends off during the summer and can help with our daughter then which will not be the case in the Fall.

I want to ensure that I have maximum possibilities in the future as I want to either go to midwifery school, physician assistant school or get a masters and pHD in psychotherapy one day in the future after my teaching career. I feel that this F will negatively affect my future career prospects as it did not help my GPA and know that I can get a good grade in the statistics course this summer with my focus and lessons that I have learned from the past. I do not have a letter from my doctor but my doctor was Dr. Bournes at Queens University who I talk to regularly and she knows that I have a child who is now 8 months old. I can also attach her birth certificate and appointments from the midwifery clinic I used.