Submit an Academic Petition or Appeal

Petition Letter: To whom it may concern,
In the fall term I had lost a first cousin tragically and unexpectedly due to a seizure leading to his passing. Since he was residing in the United States, it was more difficult to plan and have a set date for his funeral, meaning I had missed a few days of school from September 29th until October 12th (right after the Thanksgiving holiday). This had a large effect on my German and Spanish grades as missing class caused me to fall behind on all of those concepts. Being in an introductory language course, all previous content is needed to understand the new concepts that are introduced. I thought I would have the ability to overcome this hard academic time, but being a first year student, I over estimated my abilities and had nothing previous to base it on. This is one of the uncontrolled circumstances that played a major role in my unsuccessfulness in German and Spanish.

Sadly, I had developed a viral illness over the fall exam period leading to a lack in proficient studying and concentration on the actual test days. Specifically for German, I was sick to my stomach and was throwing up outside of the exam hall. I made it inside and had talked to the proctors who said I was not allowed to write my exam in the same room as others. I talked to my professor who then told me there was no make up exam so I had asked if I could write the exam in a room by myself (with a proctor). I was able to write my exam but had to stop to throw up every twenty minutes or so. This played a big part on my exam performance as I was distracted and ill feeling.

The combination of the loss of a close family member and my illness has sadly led to a negative effect on my grades.

Thank you for taking the time to read my letter,
Best Regards,
Stephanie Morettin