Petition Letter
To whom it may concern:
My name's Arthur Arnold, I am a 5th year Psychology major aiming to finally graduate at the end of the summer.
When I was 18, in my first year of university, I was involved in everything possible. I was a part of the Queen's University Rugby Team, Executive in Queens Model Parliament, and coached my high school's rugby team. In March of 2019, I suffered a major Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) that threw my whole life off course. Since I had never experienced such an injury before, I had no idea what was to come. Approximately a week after I suffered the head injury, the symptoms began to come. I told my parents, who advised me to instantly come home. At the time, I had heard that concussions would settle within a week, and so aimed for that.
2 months later, I was still in a dark room in my parents’ home, I had missed all my exams, and I had no idea who I was. By that time, I had already had an MRI, seen 5+ doctors, including multiple neurologists. None of these outlets could offer any sort of explanation. I suffered a 2nd, smaller concussion that same summer.
I aimed to regain full function for the fall semester, where I would write my PSYC 100 exam and be admitted to the PSYC program, as I had tried extremely hard due to limited amount of space they had. Unfortunately, I was still hamstrung by my concussion, and could not sit the PSYC 100 exam. Nonetheless, I became a POLS major, hoping that I'd one day be admitted. I took the risky decision to take practically all PSYC courses during the 2019-2020 academic year with no expectation or guarantee that I'd ever be admitted to the program.
I tried to push myself, taking 5 full courses in the fall semester. Although my grades were not stellar, I was able to complete them without falling behind. However, in the winter semester, having had experienced a tough, arduous schedule in the previous semester, I decided to take 3 classes. As we all know, that is when the pandemic began.
In April of 2020, I suffered my 3rd concussion – the catalyst to my long-term health problems. This was worse than both the 1st and 2nd concussions combined. What followed was over 2 years of pain, depression, and suffering. I was, by all accounts, incapable of anything. I spent my 3rd year, and part of my 4th year locked in dark room, doing nothing.
This stage was when the problems with courses truly began, and where the petition scope begins. Having had experienced what I had before, I was not able to admit that I was going through something traumatic, something worse. I did not have the capacity to understand that I was truly disabled, that I was ultimately unable to complete work. I took a full course load, but as was demonstrated, I could not do such a thing. For two of the courses, PSYC 397 (History of Modern Psychology) and PSYC 473 (Neurobiology of Psychiatric Disorder), I completed practically no work. Following the initial 2-3 weeks of the semester, I do not remember submitting much – or anything at all. These were not reflections of who I was, the work that I can, or want to produce. Yet, because of my condition, I was in no position to drop them, as I was not even able to roll out of bed. On the days I could do work, I would urge myself to attempt the course load of my other three courses, being that they were 200-level or below courses, encompassing a lighter courseload. This experience was very much reflected in my grades. Concurrently, I was seeing numerous doctors, be it weekly visits to Dr. Scott Shallow at the Kingston Orthopaedic Pain Institute, my family doctor, Dr. Delna Press, my neurologist, Dr. Neal Westreich, my QSAS advisor, Monique Dube and my physiotherapists, Dr. Will Karelsen and Dr. Michael Twigg. Additionally, I travelled to multiple concussion specialist clinics and remedy clinics in desperation for some form of a cure to my declining condition. Every single physcian could attest to that fact that I was incapable of completing coursework, much less dealing with the steps and process of dropping courses late, constantly contacting professors, and in general, getting my life back together.
The following semester was similar, but I had heeded the warnings from my doctors about re-taking that course load, and dropped it to 3, to at least continue to be a full-time student (whether that really mattered was not important, in my head, I had to convince myself I was not struggling the way I truly was). Similarly, I did not complete 2 of the courses, as I was in a worse state that even the semester before. The only course I attempted to completion was PSYC 203, as not completing it meant I could not take 95% of next year's courses and would practically be forced to drop out or fall even further behind.
Incredibly, and it continues to make me emotional to this day, as summer began to round down, into the months of August & September, I was miraculously starting to get better. There was no explanation except for hard work, well-needed rest, and time. Although I was not 100% healthy, I had finally begun to feel like myself again. This began to be reflected in my work, which was intermittently disrupted by flare up of my post-concussion syndrome (where I would have the full fledge of concussion symptoms, but without any physical injury or touch to the head). I successfully completed 3 out of my 5 taken courses (with almost all assignments using the full stretch of my accommodations to be able to complete). My remaining 2 courses, Creative Computing and Behavioural Pharmacology, were not fully completed (outstanding assignments), but I am now, very late, in contact with them to see if any remedy is available.
The next semester was the first semester where I had no baggage, no missed assignments, albeit with 4 courses. I took them all to completion. To catch up on the momentous backlog that I had, I took courses during the summer, and my final two semesters to catch up. Due to my post-concussion syndrome and accommodations, some courses have inaccurately reflected my grade (due to them being
My name's Arthur Arnold, I am a 5th year Psychology major aiming to finally graduate at the end of the summer.
When I was 18, in my first year of university, I was involved in everything possible. I was a part of the Queen's University Rugby Team, Executive in Queens Model Parliament, and coached my high school's rugby team. In March of 2019, I suffered a major Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) that threw my whole life off course. Since I had never experienced such an injury before, I had no idea what was to come. Approximately a week after I suffered the head injury, the symptoms began to come. I told my parents, who advised me to instantly come home. At the time, I had heard that concussions would settle within a week, and so aimed for that.
2 months later, I was still in a dark room in my parents’ home, I had missed all my exams, and I had no idea who I was. By that time, I had already had an MRI, seen 5+ doctors, including multiple neurologists. None of these outlets could offer any sort of explanation. I suffered a 2nd, smaller concussion that same summer.
I aimed to regain full function for the fall semester, where I would write my PSYC 100 exam and be admitted to the PSYC program, as I had tried extremely hard due to limited amount of space they had. Unfortunately, I was still hamstrung by my concussion, and could not sit the PSYC 100 exam. Nonetheless, I became a POLS major, hoping that I'd one day be admitted. I took the risky decision to take practically all PSYC courses during the 2019-2020 academic year with no expectation or guarantee that I'd ever be admitted to the program.
I tried to push myself, taking 5 full courses in the fall semester. Although my grades were not stellar, I was able to complete them without falling behind. However, in the winter semester, having had experienced a tough, arduous schedule in the previous semester, I decided to take 3 classes. As we all know, that is when the pandemic began.
In April of 2020, I suffered my 3rd concussion – the catalyst to my long-term health problems. This was worse than both the 1st and 2nd concussions combined. What followed was over 2 years of pain, depression, and suffering. I was, by all accounts, incapable of anything. I spent my 3rd year, and part of my 4th year locked in dark room, doing nothing.
This stage was when the problems with courses truly began, and where the petition scope begins. Having had experienced what I had before, I was not able to admit that I was going through something traumatic, something worse. I did not have the capacity to understand that I was truly disabled, that I was ultimately unable to complete work. I took a full course load, but as was demonstrated, I could not do such a thing. For two of the courses, PSYC 397 (History of Modern Psychology) and PSYC 473 (Neurobiology of Psychiatric Disorder), I completed practically no work. Following the initial 2-3 weeks of the semester, I do not remember submitting much – or anything at all. These were not reflections of who I was, the work that I can, or want to produce. Yet, because of my condition, I was in no position to drop them, as I was not even able to roll out of bed. On the days I could do work, I would urge myself to attempt the course load of my other three courses, being that they were 200-level or below courses, encompassing a lighter courseload. This experience was very much reflected in my grades. Concurrently, I was seeing numerous doctors, be it weekly visits to Dr. Scott Shallow at the Kingston Orthopaedic Pain Institute, my family doctor, Dr. Delna Press, my neurologist, Dr. Neal Westreich, my QSAS advisor, Monique Dube and my physiotherapists, Dr. Will Karelsen and Dr. Michael Twigg. Additionally, I travelled to multiple concussion specialist clinics and remedy clinics in desperation for some form of a cure to my declining condition. Every single physcian could attest to that fact that I was incapable of completing coursework, much less dealing with the steps and process of dropping courses late, constantly contacting professors, and in general, getting my life back together.
The following semester was similar, but I had heeded the warnings from my doctors about re-taking that course load, and dropped it to 3, to at least continue to be a full-time student (whether that really mattered was not important, in my head, I had to convince myself I was not struggling the way I truly was). Similarly, I did not complete 2 of the courses, as I was in a worse state that even the semester before. The only course I attempted to completion was PSYC 203, as not completing it meant I could not take 95% of next year's courses and would practically be forced to drop out or fall even further behind.
Incredibly, and it continues to make me emotional to this day, as summer began to round down, into the months of August & September, I was miraculously starting to get better. There was no explanation except for hard work, well-needed rest, and time. Although I was not 100% healthy, I had finally begun to feel like myself again. This began to be reflected in my work, which was intermittently disrupted by flare up of my post-concussion syndrome (where I would have the full fledge of concussion symptoms, but without any physical injury or touch to the head). I successfully completed 3 out of my 5 taken courses (with almost all assignments using the full stretch of my accommodations to be able to complete). My remaining 2 courses, Creative Computing and Behavioural Pharmacology, were not fully completed (outstanding assignments), but I am now, very late, in contact with them to see if any remedy is available.
The next semester was the first semester where I had no baggage, no missed assignments, albeit with 4 courses. I took them all to completion. To catch up on the momentous backlog that I had, I took courses during the summer, and my final two semesters to catch up. Due to my post-concussion syndrome and accommodations, some courses have inaccurately reflected my grade (due to them being