Manage Appeals
Petition Type: New
ID: 10346
Submitted: April 19, 2023 at 9:49:54 PM
First Name: John
Last Name: Gillett
Pronoun: He/Him
Preferred Name: Jack
Student Number: 20180871
Email: jack.gillett@queensu.ca
Degree Program: BA
Plan: POLS
Level of Study: 4
Petition Categories
Petition Categories: Drop a course after the academic deadline
Code: GLPH 281
Term: Summer
Year: 2022
Petition Category: Drop a course after the academic deadline
Code: MUSC 171
Term: Summer
Year: 2022
Petition Category: Drop a course after the academic deadline
Petition Letter
Petition Letter: Jack Gillett
Student No. 20180871
Dear Office of the Associate Dean,
I am writing this letter as a petition to late drop courses GLPH 281 and MUSC 171 taken during the Summer 2022 semester and have them listed as ??DR? on my transcript. The extenuating circumstances that I will outline below had a significant impact on my mental health which contributed to my ability to complete the course work.
At the end of the Winter 2022 semester, my full-time job that I had been working all year closed for the summer as most of the students were leaving Kingston. This of course left me without a job and a source of income that I would need to pay rent all summer. After I had experienced a difficult time attempting to find another job, I was essentially forced to relocate back to Toronto as I could not afford to pay rent, utilities, or pay for food without a steady source of income that I was used to when working full time. When I moved back to Toronto, my summer courses started, however, I also had to start looking for employment opportunities in Toronto now as well to pay rent on my lease back in Kingston. Finding a job proved to be more difficult that I had anticipated, and in addition to GLPH 281 and MUSC 171 I had also been taking a third course at the time too.
By the time I had found a job in June 2022 I was in a deficit both financially and academically. The financial struggles I was facing placed a lot of stress on me mentally, as they do to most people who have been in these situations. Naturally, this made it difficult to keep up with and complete schoolwork, and while I wanted to pursue my studies over the summer semester, these circumstances severely affected my ability to do so. I had to dedicate so much time and effort into finding a job and working more than full-time to make payments on time that it left little time to care for myself and complete schoolwork. My shifts on Friday for example would often look like a 10:00 am start after having worked past midnight the night before and then end at around 10:00 pm. This was no easy task to complete alongside school five times as week as I was working in a busy cocktail bar in downtown Toronto that is a very fast paced and high stress environment. I would return home at 10:30 pm where I would then have to eat, and then essentially go to bed to do it all over again. Aside from the one or two days off I would have in a week, I hope you can see how it was difficult to be able to fit the workload of three courses into this schedule.
The reason why I was able to complete FRST 105 that semester and not the other two courses that I am petitioning to drop is because I was only able to balance one course with everything else going on and that was the course that I had arbitrarily selected out of the three. As I??m sure you can see, I was not even able to complete that course to the best of my ability either only finishing with a D- as my final grade, which I hope can be an indicator of how much these extenuating circumstances affected my ability to succeed and thrive as a student.
Once I was able to get back onto my feet and lighten my workload in terms of the number of hours I was working in a week, I was already too far behind in GLPH 281 and MUSC 171 and if I had attempted to make up for all of that I would have likely found myself back in a similar situation and letting the cycle repeat itself. I would happily accept an ??F? if it was the final grade I received in both courses after completing all of the course content and assignments, but that is not the case here. I was never given a fair chance to put my best effort into the courses because of my circumstances. I believe that it is wrong for me to be facing the possible consequences that come from having two failed courses on my transcript that I was never even able to participate in, engage with, and learn from because of my situation.
I ask that you please consider the circumstances that I have face when deliberating on the approval of my petition and request to be granted a late drop for GLPH 281 and MUSC 171 from the Summer 2022 semester. I would also like to add that these courses should be dropped from my transcript as they are not an accurate representation of who I am as a student at Queen??s and they do not reflect my habits, work ethic, or values. Should the grades of these two courses remain on my transcript and not be dropped, the opportunities that I am presented with in the future can be negatively impacted by the way that a possible employer views a failed course for example and how that paints me in a bad light when no context can be provided.
I have consistently held a full-time job for the last two and a half years while studying at Queen??s University full-time and this is the only time that it has ever impacted my academics in any way and my transcript can reflect that. After the Summer 2022 semester, I made the commitment to myself to take the steps I needed to ensure that would never happen again. This included better communication with my workplace and informing them when I had class, letting them know well ahead of time when I had multiple assignments or assessments due in the same week, using a daily planner to remain organized and prioritize the most important things in my life like academics, and most importantly standing firm on my decision to put my academics first. I also made lifestyle changes like changing my eating habits, sleeping more, exercising frequently, and surrounding myself with individuals who are positive, driven, and strive to achieve the goals that they set out for themselves. This has allowed me to not only continue to work full time but also succeed and thrive in my academics as I wrap up my final semester of my undergraduate studies.
For supporting documentation, I am unable to provide any statement from a medical professional as at the time I was not actively seeing my usual mental health professional due to the inability to afford appointments. I can contact them and have them provide a statement as to how the outlined circumstances would have affected my mental health and ability to complete courses if that is permitted and will help support my petition. Additionally, I can also provide pay stubs and other work/financial related paperwork to support the timeline of events and demonstrate the extent of my financial hardships that ultimately put me in this situation. Please let me know if any documentation of that nature may help in approving my request and I will provide it as soon as possible.
Thank you for taking time to read and consider my petition. I look forward to your response.
Sincerely,
Jack Gillett
Student No. 20180871
Dear Office of the Associate Dean,
I am writing this letter as a petition to late drop courses GLPH 281 and MUSC 171 taken during the Summer 2022 semester and have them listed as ??DR? on my transcript. The extenuating circumstances that I will outline below had a significant impact on my mental health which contributed to my ability to complete the course work.
At the end of the Winter 2022 semester, my full-time job that I had been working all year closed for the summer as most of the students were leaving Kingston. This of course left me without a job and a source of income that I would need to pay rent all summer. After I had experienced a difficult time attempting to find another job, I was essentially forced to relocate back to Toronto as I could not afford to pay rent, utilities, or pay for food without a steady source of income that I was used to when working full time. When I moved back to Toronto, my summer courses started, however, I also had to start looking for employment opportunities in Toronto now as well to pay rent on my lease back in Kingston. Finding a job proved to be more difficult that I had anticipated, and in addition to GLPH 281 and MUSC 171 I had also been taking a third course at the time too.
By the time I had found a job in June 2022 I was in a deficit both financially and academically. The financial struggles I was facing placed a lot of stress on me mentally, as they do to most people who have been in these situations. Naturally, this made it difficult to keep up with and complete schoolwork, and while I wanted to pursue my studies over the summer semester, these circumstances severely affected my ability to do so. I had to dedicate so much time and effort into finding a job and working more than full-time to make payments on time that it left little time to care for myself and complete schoolwork. My shifts on Friday for example would often look like a 10:00 am start after having worked past midnight the night before and then end at around 10:00 pm. This was no easy task to complete alongside school five times as week as I was working in a busy cocktail bar in downtown Toronto that is a very fast paced and high stress environment. I would return home at 10:30 pm where I would then have to eat, and then essentially go to bed to do it all over again. Aside from the one or two days off I would have in a week, I hope you can see how it was difficult to be able to fit the workload of three courses into this schedule.
The reason why I was able to complete FRST 105 that semester and not the other two courses that I am petitioning to drop is because I was only able to balance one course with everything else going on and that was the course that I had arbitrarily selected out of the three. As I??m sure you can see, I was not even able to complete that course to the best of my ability either only finishing with a D- as my final grade, which I hope can be an indicator of how much these extenuating circumstances affected my ability to succeed and thrive as a student.
Once I was able to get back onto my feet and lighten my workload in terms of the number of hours I was working in a week, I was already too far behind in GLPH 281 and MUSC 171 and if I had attempted to make up for all of that I would have likely found myself back in a similar situation and letting the cycle repeat itself. I would happily accept an ??F? if it was the final grade I received in both courses after completing all of the course content and assignments, but that is not the case here. I was never given a fair chance to put my best effort into the courses because of my circumstances. I believe that it is wrong for me to be facing the possible consequences that come from having two failed courses on my transcript that I was never even able to participate in, engage with, and learn from because of my situation.
I ask that you please consider the circumstances that I have face when deliberating on the approval of my petition and request to be granted a late drop for GLPH 281 and MUSC 171 from the Summer 2022 semester. I would also like to add that these courses should be dropped from my transcript as they are not an accurate representation of who I am as a student at Queen??s and they do not reflect my habits, work ethic, or values. Should the grades of these two courses remain on my transcript and not be dropped, the opportunities that I am presented with in the future can be negatively impacted by the way that a possible employer views a failed course for example and how that paints me in a bad light when no context can be provided.
I have consistently held a full-time job for the last two and a half years while studying at Queen??s University full-time and this is the only time that it has ever impacted my academics in any way and my transcript can reflect that. After the Summer 2022 semester, I made the commitment to myself to take the steps I needed to ensure that would never happen again. This included better communication with my workplace and informing them when I had class, letting them know well ahead of time when I had multiple assignments or assessments due in the same week, using a daily planner to remain organized and prioritize the most important things in my life like academics, and most importantly standing firm on my decision to put my academics first. I also made lifestyle changes like changing my eating habits, sleeping more, exercising frequently, and surrounding myself with individuals who are positive, driven, and strive to achieve the goals that they set out for themselves. This has allowed me to not only continue to work full time but also succeed and thrive in my academics as I wrap up my final semester of my undergraduate studies.
For supporting documentation, I am unable to provide any statement from a medical professional as at the time I was not actively seeing my usual mental health professional due to the inability to afford appointments. I can contact them and have them provide a statement as to how the outlined circumstances would have affected my mental health and ability to complete courses if that is permitted and will help support my petition. Additionally, I can also provide pay stubs and other work/financial related paperwork to support the timeline of events and demonstrate the extent of my financial hardships that ultimately put me in this situation. Please let me know if any documentation of that nature may help in approving my request and I will provide it as soon as possible.
Thank you for taking time to read and consider my petition. I look forward to your response.
Sincerely,
Jack Gillett
Documentation
Professional Letter Detail: NO DOC