Submit an Academic Petition or Appeal

Petition Letter: I am writing this appeal in hopes of dropping a course, Analytical Genomics, after the drop deadline.

My performance in this course has been negatively affected by the mental health issues with which I have struggled for the past 6 years. I have experienced seasonal depression and generalized anxiety over this period but it is usually only in times of unusual stress that these issues become unmanageable. This past winter was a hard one for several reasons; all of the classes in which I was enrolled were either quite challenging or very new to me. The unusually harsh winter made it difficult to spend time out of doors getting exercise and sunlight, two of the things that are crucial to my management of seasonal depression. I am normally an avid biker year-round but after a fall on my bike at the beginning of semester I was forced to retire my bicycle for most of the winter semester. Due to the challenges I was experiencing during the semester midterm and finals season became very difficult and I experienced depressive episodes during both of these times, which resulted in significant difficulties retaining information while studying, focusing and sleeping. The stresses of finals season, however, were further compounded when my rental house developed a sewage leak in the basement (March 30) and flooded as a result of a botched repair job (April 6). When the issues were not properly dealt with by our landlord a search for new, safer housing began in a time when I was already struggling to study for finals and finish end-of-the-semester projects. I am very much a homebody and feeling secure in my home is crucial to my metal well-being and academic performance. Having to be constantly on-call to accommodate plumbers and searching for new housing during an already unstable time was an enormous challenge.

The reason that Analytical Genomics in particular was challenging for me was because of the way the assignments were evaluated. The course had a set of 4 assignments for which I did not feel particularly prepared and the deadline on these assignments was frighteningly fluid ¿¿ our professor gave a guide for when the assignments should be sent in but told the class that he would accept submissions with no penalty until all the other students¿¿ assignments (over 200) were marked. While in many ways this is a generous offer, unfortunately for someone suffering crippling anxiety completing assignments under such circumstances felt much like living life under a guillotine, never knowing when the time would run out. As the end of semester loomed and issues with other classes and the safety of my home were constantly on my mind I felt nearly unable to work. The work I did complete was of low quality and I was not able to complete all the assignments before the deadline.

While my struggles with mental health issues may never be completely solved I believe that they can be managed. Normally I plan on taking one or two courses that come more naturally to me (ecology, evolutionary biology) to function as an academic comfort zone in which I can maintain composure while studying. Unfortunately this comfort zone, despite my efforts, did not function as such this past semester. In future I hope to seek more advice from other students when enrolling in classes so as to better understand the schedule that I choose for myself. While I have always been an anxious person it is only recently that I have begun to understand my anxiety as an affliction and not just a personality quirk that I must accept and learn to live with. I believe my pervasive anxiety and worry to be one of the chief sources of my depression and learning to manage this anxiety has become an important life goal. After many attempts to find help with my mental health issues ¿¿ all rather unsuccessful ¿¿ I was finally put in touch with an off-campus counselor by the counselor I spoke with at HCDS. She and I have been meeting regularly since the end of the semester and I am confident that with her guidance I will be able to devise healthier and more effective ways to cope with my anxiety