Submit an Academic Petition or Appeal

Petition Letter: Dear Dr. Jenn Stephenson, Associate Dean (Academic),

I am petitioning for a formal revaluation of grades I received for two assignments in HLTH 323, Introduction to Epidemiology, taught by Dr. Eun-Young Lee. I feel the grades I received do not accurately reflect the quality of my work. For each assignment, I submitted a regrade request to Dr. Lee outlining the precise reasons why my grade did not align with the rubric, as well as advocating for sections where I believe I lost marks unjustly. Below, I explain some specifics from each assignment which show why I believe my work was not evaluated fairly, then explain why I believe Dr. Lee has shown bias against me and my academic work.

Assignment #8:
This assignment, a three-page report on an epidemiology news story, was graded as an F (46.24%). Dr. Lee responded to my regrade request, indicating that they would not be submitting my assignment for a regrade. I was disappointed with their response as it did not address most of the points in my email, instead suggesting I deserved a mark even lower than the one I received.

I believe Dr. Lee did not adhere to the rubric and assignment instructions for several reasons. These are a few which I find the most dissonant.
1) My assignment was marked as having three sections well addressed, two moderately well, and two not well, yet I received an F on the content section of the rubric. According to Dr. Lee’s rubric, that should have earned me at least a D.
2) I received a C (“adequate style and grammar, with 5+ errors”) in the writing section, yet only one grammatical error was pointed out in my paper.
3) I lost marks because my assignment used terminology that the general public would not understand, but the assignment instructions did not specify the general public as the audience.


Assignment #9:
This assignment was a one-page infographic summarizing an epidemiology research study and was graded as an F (46.24%). Dr. Lee indicated that they would not be submitting my assignment for a regrade and accused me of plagiarism. Although the response brings up valid points, I disagree that my assignment constituted a departure from academic integrity. The response also disregarded many points I made in my regrade request.

I believe Dr. Lee did not adhere to the rubric and assignment instructions for several reasons. These are some examples:
1) I received an F on the content section, but I included all required elements and answered them, which should not have earned me an F, according to Dr. Lee’s rubric.
2) I was accused of plagiarism on a phrase, and I was unable to find that phrase in the research article, nor was it flagged on Turnitin.


I believe Dr. Lee’s decision to not review my grades for these two assignments was unreasonable and biased. For context, in HLTH 323, we had quizzes in which we were encouraged to work together in groups. After one of these quizzes, Dr. Lee called me and my peers whom I worked on the quiz with into their office hours for a meeting. We were accused of cheating on the quiz as Dr. Lee found it suspicious we had received such a high mark given they “did not recognize our names as top students in the class”. There was no proof, and we had not cheated. After that incident, I had reason to believe Dr. Lee was not fond of me.

Furthermore, we had an assignment which involved getting an online certificate, and then writing a short report about it. When I got my mark back, it was only 50%, as I did not include the actual certificate in my submission. I was confident I had submitted it, and this must have been a technical error, so I emailed Dr. Lee explaining the situation and included proof showing I had completed the certificate weeks before the assignment deadline. Dr. Lee said they would not accept this, as my attendance record did not meet the criteria for their “let-it-slide” late policy. Participation was not a part of the mark in the class, attendance was not regularly taken, and I did attend class. I feel this also shows bias on Dr. Lee’s part.

I am a good student. I work hard and regularly receive As in my assignments and classes. For the record, I took another class taught by Dr. Lee last year, HLTH 252, and received an A. I am puzzled by the fact that my mark in this assignment deviated so much from my previous work, including that which Dr. Lee seemed to think was good last year.

I would greatly appreciate a formal review of Dr. Lee’s decision. I have included documentation of my submission for the assignment, the rubric Dr. Lee said would be used for evaluation, and my email and the response. I am happy to provide any more information which could help.

Best regards,
Rachel Gawenda