Submit an Academic Petition or Appeal

Petition Letter: I am writing in regards to my Computer Science course that I took in the winter term. Due to extenuating circumstances, I was unable to complete the CISC121 exam to my full abilities, resulting in a failure. I took it out of interest - it was not a required course for what I am interested in going into (Physics and Astronomy). I find coding interesting so I thought it was a good way to learn a bit about it. Throughout the semester, I completed all of my homework and most assignments with good grades. Unfortunately, I became overwhelmed this term with work from my other courses (required ones) and some personal and family health issues and my school work suffered. I could not focus and spend the time needed to successfully pass the course.

Right around the time where I started to study for exams, my sister was diagnosed with Covid and our family was under quarantine for almost three weeks. During that time my mental and physical health deteriorated to a point where I hadn't had a fresh breath of air in weeks. I was struggling this whole semester being at home with little to no stimulation from friends or family outside of my home. Being locked down made me even more depressed and stressed out because I was too focused on if my sister would be okay, and if my mom and I would catch it ourselves.

As well, I had health issues of my own - I had an eye infection that affected my vision and gave me headaches. And then close after that, I had a very bad throat infection. I was getting tested for Covid as well in case these were random symptoms. It was a stressful few weeks and this came right after my sister having Covid.

At this point, my exam was nearing and I still felt very trapped in my own head and put myself down to a point where I felt as though I couldn't do anything right when it came to studying. Ive had test anxiety ever since high school which I have learned to cope with a bit but under these special circumstances, I completely blanked out on the exam and forgot everything I worked hard to understand. I knew right away while doing the exam that I couldn't remember anything. I had a panic attack and couldn't focus. As soon as the exam time was up, I emailed my teacher explaining what had happened and started frantically to research what I should do, how a fail would affect my overall marks, how it would affect my program for next year. It was a very difficult few days of feeling like I had ruined my whole university timeline. I want to get into Physics and Astronomy more than anything and my grades were more than enough prior to this test. I feel terrible because I took this course out of interest and now I feel like it may have derailed my plans.

If there is any way my extenuating circumstances can be taken into consideration - please let me know. It has been such a difficult year for everyone and I feel like I had been doing okay right until the end. And I am so looking forward to going in person in September. I feel like there is a huge dark cloud over everything now and hopefully, there can be some help I can receive. My family doctor is able to provide my full health workup as well as my sister's covid.

Thank you for your time.