Submit an Academic Petition or Appeal

Petition Letter: My name is Jake Gibson and my student number is 20360068 and I am petitioning a late drop for DEVS 102 (winter term), FILM 112 (Winter term), HIST 106 (Winter term) and WRIT 125 (winter term), due to extenuating circumstances that heavily impacted my year as well as my academic performance through 2024 and 2025.

Starting in the Fall semester of October, I started to have strong feelings of depression and anxiety that had a significant effect on my social life, my well-being and my focus on academics. I frequently travelled back to the city to spend time with my family as I felt more comfortable being at home, and had a better ability to express to my family how I was feeling. These emotions carried on throughout the Fall semester and well into the winter semester continuing to have an impact on my studies and my time at the school. It wasn't until late February/early March where I started to take on more stress and anxiety due to lack of focus on school and the harm it could have on my academic progress. Prompting me to see Student Wellness and address the issues I was having to a wellness counsellor. In addition to that, since this anxiety that developed over the winter semester was more than I could handle on my own, I addressed this issue further with my parents and we collectively came to the decision it was in my best interest to see a therapist. I tried salvaging what I could with the courses I was currently enrolled in, however, with so much going on, it was simply more than I could handle. I still see the same therapist to this day, and decided for this year (2025/2026) it was in my best interest to take a lighter course load, so I could develop proper organizational habits to help me advance for the following year. This current year has been going a lot better as I have made more of an effort to partake in my classes, and allow for more time to do homework and readings outside of class. I also decided that it would be within my best interest to switch houses and be by myself to allow for fewer outside distractions and a greater ability to complete work and find a schedule that works for me.

My goal is to move forward and I really do enjoy being in Politics as well as Philosophy, and my hope is to be able to Major in Politics with a minor in Philosophy, however, having these courses on my transcript limits my options to be accepted and enrolled in classes I want to be a part of. I understand that this is my doing, and I'd like to take full responsibility for not addressing my issues sooner and seeking Faculty help to ensure a better way of continuing and getting information. Which is why I am petitioning now to drop these courses, the plan set out by myself as well as my therapist was to see how this year went regarding my courses, before making final decisions and taking steps to move on. The intention was to see whether I personally was ready to be back in this atmosphere and take on the responsibility having course-work, while managing my life outside of school. I can tell you definitively that I do want to be here, and I am having greater success managing my school and personal life, and that competence and organization are not an issue, it was simply outside factors that had an influence on my school year.

I would just like a chance to prove my capabilities and willingness to be here in further years and having these courses removed from my transcript can help me prove this. I truly do want to be here at Queens University and would just like a chance to take my studies further.

I'd like to thank you for reviewing my petition, regardless of the decision and I hope by reading my letter, you can see that my problems in school are due to external factors, for which I have taken great lengths to fix.

I'm making a comment here, just in case when I press next, this letter is finalized, as I wasn't able to submit supporting documentation, and hope that if the need to attach more documentation is needed, I will get in touch with my doctor and therapist to provide more support.

I appreciate your time and consideration for my appeal.

Sincerely,
Jake Gibson
20360068
First-year BA
22jrg@queensu.ca
Monday, April 6, 2026