Submit an Academic Petition or Appeal

Petition Letter: Dear Alex Rose,

I am writing you in the appeal process of dropping IDIS 280 (Interprofessional Approaches in Healthcare) without any form of academic or financial penalty. I have now been in the process of dropping this course for almost an entire month but have only been directed to this stage now. I have continuously struggled in my attempts to communicate with the Queen's registrar's office for advice on this matter as they have repeatedly sent me to an area of the office that is currently unavailable and experiencing technical difficulties. In addition, I received inaccurate information from one member of the advisory claiming that I must drop IDIS 280 before submitting my appeal. But when I attempted to drop the course on Solus I was unable to as the date to drop courses has now long passed. I only learned today from a different employee within the advisory that the instructions given to me were backward. Instead, I must submit and be approved on an appeal before I am able to drop this course. I hope this statement explains the untimely manner of my appeal.

The reason I am appealing to drop IDIS 280 is because of a long and difficult battle I had with Covid-19 earlier on in the semester. I first contracted the virus on January 28, 2022. I was then sick for 10 days following this date. During this time, I was bedridden with a horrible cough and headache. I was completely unable to continue my studies. All of this was relayed to my 6 courses including IDIS 280 on a day-to-day basis. I kept in touch with my group projects and continued to help and contribute in any way that I could. After I felt that my symptoms had subsided, I then returned to my studies and routine. In addition, I contacted the teaching team of IDIS 280 and initiated an action plan for how I would catch up in this course. I purposed numerous times that we could meet virtually for a quick meeting to discuss this matter to avoid the layover time between the back and forth emails. My invitations to meet virtually were continuously ignored and instead they continued to email me. Shortly after I returned to my studies I began to feel the aftermath of my experience with covid. It quickly occurred to me that I was now suffering from a long-term covid experience and that the rest and break I had taken away from school were not enough. As a result, I had to return home to be appropriately taken care of by my parents. I spent another week recovering there. At this point, I had now taken almost 3 and a half weeks away from my studies and was developing a high level of work and stress in not only IDIS 280 but my 5 other courses as well. It was then that I decided that based on my experience with the teaching team from IDIS 280 and with the success of my other courses in mind, I needed to drop this course. Once I made this decision I promptly let the teaching team know. This was on March 20, 2022. Since then I have been trying to drop this course via Solus and through the registrar's phone communication.

As a successful student, I do not feel as if dropping this course hinders my future abilities to pursue a successful following term at Queen's. I selected IDIS 280 as an additional course to my already full course load at the beginning of the winter semester. Unfortunately, my unexpected experience with Covid-19 made tackling the additional work in this course virtually impossible. In the future, I will definitely consider the possibility of contracting such a sickness and how it may affect my studies, in the long run, to best avoid academic pressure in the future.

Based on this information I hope that you can consider my appeal and understand my extenuating circumstances throughout this term. I appreciate the help I have received to get this far in the process and the time you have taken to review my application.

Sincerely,
Harper Sacks-Kilback