Submit an Academic Petition or Appeal

Petition Letter: Dear Associate Dean (Studies),

The Request:

I am writing this letter to request to drop fourteen failed courses from the time range of Winter 2011 to Winter 2014. I was only able to add twelve courses in the online appeal form so I have sent the other two via email to asc.appeals@queensu.ca.

Explanation of Extenuating Circumstances:

In winter 2011, I was diagnosed with depression. It was very severe from winter 2011 to winter 2012. I also had a lot of troubles coping with anxiety, which only made my depression worse. During this time period, I tried several medications (cipralex, pristiq) but nothing seemed to make me feel better. The only people who knew about my troubles were my counselor (Dr. Arunima Khanna) and doctor. I felt a lot of shame associated with it and could not talk to my friends or family about it, which only made me feel worse because I did not have much support. During the summer, when I finally did tell my parents I was on anti-depressants, they were really against me taking drugs and convinced me to go off of them. I spent most of my time in my room on my bed, hardly ate, and often times lost track of time/dates. I managed to pass only two courses in Winter 2011 semester. From Fall 2011 to Winter 2012, I hardly went to class, or hand in assignments and even missed final exams and as a result, failed everything.

During the summer of 2012, since I was still not getting better, my counselor referred me to a psychiatrist (Dr. Kenny) at LaSalle. I was seeing both a counselor and psychiatrist. I was trying really hard and was getting to most of my classes, doing assignments, and going to tests. However, around late September-early October, I started to relapse and I had an incident where I attempted to overdose on my medication. I tried several different medications after and the side effects to some of the drugs really affected me. I did temporarily find a drug that helped with my mood and anxiety (remeron), however, as a side effect I gained a lot of weight. The weight gain really affected my self-esteem and I could not handle it so I stopped the medication. I began to get severely depressed again around the end of Fall 2012. For fall semester, some assignments and tests I got waived and I tried really hard to make it to all my exams. However, I was too sick to make it to MATH 384 final, and got it deferred. Even with the deferral, I was not well enough to write it during winter semester and subsequently failed the course. My depression really impeded my ability to function in winter. I hardly went to class and barely handed in any work and did not show up for final exams. I failed all of them except STAT 269 because my counselor and professor encouraged me to get the exam deferred because it was a prerequisite for many courses. During the summer, I went home and worked to regain some routine back into my life, such as eating and sleeping habits.

When I came back for fall 2013, I was determined to not fall back into old patterns. Fortunately, I only had minor relapses. After getting some distressing news, I fell back into some old habits for around a week period in November. However, this caused me to miss the midterm for MTHE 474. Due to missing the midterm, I had a lot of anxiety about the final exam and it really affected my sleeping, eating, studying and performance and as a result, I failed. In Winter 2014, I started slipping more and more back into old patterns, especially after getting some very bad news around mid-February. As a result, I missed the midterms for MATH 281. Once again, due to missing the midterms, I had a lot of anxiety and pressure about the final exams and I failed MATH 281. Also, unknown to me at the time, I was dealing with an undiagnosed medical condition where my body does not produce enough thyroid hormone. I was experiencing many of the symptoms, such as fatigue, slight muscle aches, and hair loss, which further stressed me out more (especially the hair loss). I recently started the medication, synthroid, to treat this imbalance.

Future Plans:

It has been a really hard journey for me and took a lot of effort for me to get where I am today. Finally, I am in a program I love (Statistics) and see myself working in that field in the future. I am even considering the possibility of further education. In the past, I did not even consider future plans because I did not think there would be a future for me. I know I am still not fully healthy, but each year (from 2011-2014), I made steady improvements. Now I am only one semester away from completing an undergraduate Bachelor of Science honours degree in statistics. Thank you for your time and consideration.