Submit an Academic Petition or Appeal

Petition Letter: My name is Moira Bylyku, I am a fourth year returning to my studies for the fall and winter semester and I plan to graduate in Spring of 2025. I am submitting an appeal to late drop two of my courses from the Fall 2023 semester because of extenuating circumstances around that time, as I will explain below.

For the year of 2023, I was severely struggling with my mental illness. I am currently diagnosed with BPD and MDD and I have accommodations registered with QSAS. During this year, I was also in a relationship that was verbally and emotionally abusive. This had severe negative impacts on my mental health and unfortunately got in the way of my schoolwork. At this time, my mental health had never been worse and I also unfortunately suffered a miscarriage that made the days even more challenging for me. Because of that, I fell behind in my schoolwork and I was never able to catch up. As a result, I failed my philosophy courses. Since the beginning of 2024, I have taken the steps to get better as I will explain below.

I decided to take the winter semester off in January because of my mental health as I did not want it to affect my schoolwork anymore. For the last 9 months, beginning in January of 2024, I began seeing a therapist to better cope with my mental illness. I have learned to better deal with my emotions and my stressors so that it does not get in the way of my schoolwork as much. I also managed to get out of that controlling relationship though it was difficult and traumatizing to do so. I am returning to my studies to complete my final year with hopes to graduate in the Spring.

Although this happened to me and resulted in a negative impact on my academics, I am taking the steps to move forward and be better for this upcoming year. I hope my appeal is accepted so that my GPA can accurately reflect my academic potential.