Submit an Academic Petition or Appeal

Petition Letter: Dear,
¿¿ Dr. Jill Atkinson
¿¿ Dr. Johanne Bénard

The Request:
I am appealing for:
¿¿ a credit standing grade for POLS310, which I completed in the Fall 2016 semester
¿¿ an aegrotat standing for POLS313, which I was enrolled in the Fall 2016 semester
¿¿ a credit standing grade for POLS385, which I completed in the Winter 2017 semester
¿¿ an aegrotat standing for RELS131, which I was enrolled in the Fall/Winter 2016/2017 year

Explanation of Extenuating Circumstances:
The 2016-2017 academic year was one of the most difficult times of my life as I was faced with multiple instances of physical illness and psychological challenges. A week before the Fall 2016 semester, my cousin committed suicide. This was very unexpected and took a toll on my mental health. It was very difficult to complete every day tasks because I have never lost someone so close to me in this manner before and was not able to mourn the loss with my family, as I had to travel to Kingston 2 days after the funeral, to attend my classes. I felt like I could not confide in anyone and struggled internally to handle the loss. I decided not to seek counselling at Queen¿¿s due to a negative experience in first year. Furthermore, on October 31, 2016, I sustained a knee injury. This injury made it difficult to sleep and move around, which made attending class and finishing assignments challenging. The lack of sleep further affected my health and ability to focus in school. The combination of the injury and the loss of my cousin often left me feeling hopeless and extremely stressed. I struggled to do things I once enjoyed, such as dancing. In the past I have always enjoyed writing, which is very important for my degree as a lot of assignments are essays. This year, for the first time, I struggled to put my thoughts into words and be able to write an academic paper that I was comfortable submitting. Things that I loved to do in the past were becoming things that caused my body and my mind so much stress. In the Winter 2017 semester, I experienced something very similar to the previous semester. On March 11, 2017, I sustained an ankle injury which affected my ability to attend class and sleep. As I didn¿¿t receive medical attention immediately, the injury worsened and upon my doctor¿¿s advice, I could not walk on the ankle whatsoever. Like the previous knee injury in the Fall semester, this injury worsened beyond its initial examination, but had to be managed with pain medication and time to heal. Due to the physical pain, and lack of sleep, I fell behind in my coursework and struggled to catch up for the remainder of the semester. My sleep-schedule was greatly affected and I found myself struggling to obtain enough sleep to function properly throughout the day. The physical exhaustion negatively impacted my mental health, and managing the side effects from the injury, and its medicine, consumed majority of my energy. Moreover, on April 6th, 2017, a day before my first exam, I unfortunately learned that another cousin of mine committed suicide a day before. I struggled to hold myself together during this period as I was very confused as to why people so dear to me were resulting to suicide instead of approaching their loved ones for help, I was devastated and felt very lost. This year genuinely felt like a real-life nightmare. Within 8 months, I sustained two immobilizing injuries and unexpectedly lost two individuals whom I grown up with. These factors combined have been detrimental to my academic success this year. I struggled to complete assignments and stay up to date with my courses as my body and mind were under constant stress and I was very unhappy. These circumstances were very foreign to me and as I live away from my family to attend school, handling this on my own was very challenging. Furthermore, after doing more research, I learnt that academic appeals have a time restriction and was unfortunately not aware of this ahead of time. After my final exams in April, I was finally able to come home and mourn these losses with my family and only after I was able to properly digest what had happened did I start looking into and trying to move forward with other things such as my school work. I have decided to include all 4 of the courses I would like to appeal in one because the circumstances that affected my academic affairs accumulated throughout the year, are relevant to one another and affected each course increasingly as the year went by. I have spoken to an academic counselor and they recommended that I include all 4 courses in one appeal as well. I am requesting for the above stated courses to hold a credit standing or aegrotat standing because I truly believe that these circumstances affected my ability to produce my best work and showcase what I am academically capable of.
Note: For both POLS 313 and RELS 131, the courses I am requesting an aegrotat standing in, I have completed at least 60 of the course work and was only unable to complete 1 assignment per course (the essay).

Future Plan:
Moving forward, I have decided to discontinue dancing competitively during the academic year, as both my injuries were the result of rigorous dance training and rehearsals. As per my doctor¿¿s advice, I have decided it is best to decrease this extra-curricular commitment and focus on keeping my body healthy. To cope with the loss of my cousins, I have turned to gaining more knowledge about mental health through research and plan to volunteer at a crisis-hotline in Kingston to help individuals struggling with mental health, in memory of my cousins. This summer, I focused on learning about myself and my body by speaking to my doctor on how to handle stress in a healthy manner, and produced coping methods such as meditation and exercise, to help reduce stress and increase focus.

Sincerely,
Shamana Sathiyasothy