Submit an Academic Petition or Appeal

Petition Letter: Dear Associate Dean, I am appealing the Faculty¿¿s decision that I must withdraw from Queen¿¿s for a year.

Background

My mother divorced my father 3 years ago, and since then my parents have been in and out of court due to my fathers¿¿ unwillingness to pay for spousal or child support. My mom is jobless mom due to being married off to my father at 19. I have been living with my mom and my 3 younger siblings, who are unfortunately also being affected by the financial hell that we are currently in. My two younger siblings (Sara, 9, Zane, 6) are thankfully young and are still able to maintain a happy lifestyle despite the circumstances. My 17 year old brother, however, has been battling severe depression since July, and has also been treated many times as he eats less than one meal a day. I felt very guilty leaving for Queens and leaving him in September, as well as my entire family. My mom is equally depressed if not more. She has been taking stress relief pills and gets irritated quite easily but has done so much for us. I don¿¿t blame her though, especially with all the problems she¿¿s going through with my devil of a dad. If it wasn¿¿t for OSAP, I would not have been able to pay for my tuition. My rent however, was another situation. The first semester financially wasn¿¿t too bad, but second semester was. In second semester, my father¿¿s clinic burnt down due a gas leak and he claimed to be unfit to work. This led to a complete cutoff of money, which has lasted 4 months so far. I got into many issues with my landlord regarding rent and was almost evicted twice due to the repeatedly late payments I was making. My mother was getting loans on all of her credit cards in order to maintain somewhat of a life for us. My uncle even visited and helped with mortgage payments, and thankfully my rent for last year was paid off just recently.

I wish I could say these are all my troubles, but unfortunately there were many problems in the house I was living in, off-res in the student ghetto. Towards the end of last year I met 3 great guys, Omar Maliyar, Mo Hasnain, and Usaid Razakazee. They are all aspiring lawyers who are very smart and very friendly. This year all four of us suffered greatly, mainly due to a problem one of us faced. Usaid has been battling depression for the past 2 years, and had been very troubled and conflicted for the entire year. After a conflict with Omar towards the end of first semester, Usaid told Omar to watch his back and that he would kill him in his sleep. This threat terrified Omar and led to many conflicts between them later in the year. As the year progressed, Usaid became more reckless, angry and frankly more terrifying. In January, he shaved his head completely, saying he didn¿¿t want his hair. In February, Usaid told me that life was meaningless and that we are all only here to suffer. In March, he told me he wanted to kill himself. In March, he also had a conflict with Mo in which he also said he was going to kill him in his sleep. In April, he walked into Omar¿¿s room (where I also was) holding a piece of broken glass and started chewing the glass in his mouth¿. The sound was so unnerving, I¿¿ve tried to forget it but unfortunately, it¿¿s easier said than done. His reasoning was that it was emotionally freeing and that we should all try it. In April, he also told me that he was going to kill me. I wanted to believe it was a joke as he was my friend, but even as I am writing this I am unsure as to why he would even say that as a joke. I tried not to worry but ended up buying a lock and began locking my door at night. He¿¿s also mentioned killing my father as well as his own, saying they both deserved to die. A couple days into exams, Usaid called a couple classmates and told them he was also going to kill them. Two of them called the police and they came to our house and questioned us. We told them everything about his depression and how he said he wanted to kill us and they took Usaid to the Kingston Hospital to have him speak with a doctor. The next day his parents packed all his things and he went home for the summer, the rest of his exams cancelled. The doctor concluded that Usaid had been suffering from a bipolar disorder as well as anxiety, paranoia, and was also clearly troubled. I¿¿m not too sure about what medical treatments he¿¿s received since then, but I hear he¿¿s gotten a lot better.

I too, have gotten better (thankfully). I think being out of that environment is what really healed me, and just being back with my family again, despite the never ending financial issues we are having. Mo, Omar, Usaid and I signed for a house on Albert street for next year in February and after the events of second semester, Usaid¿¿s father made him pull out of the lease, which I¿¿m guilty to say has been the best news I¿¿ve ever heard. The unfortunate news is that I still have to pay for rent. I was thankfully able to convince my father to pay for my May rent, but embarrassingly enough had my uncle pay for June. I currently have a job in order to pay for July and August, and when the OSAP money comes in September I will be able to pay for tuition as well.

I am not trying to use these past events as a way to excuse my academic failure, but rather just to lay out the environment I was in during the school year. Thankfully my life it has gotten much better, as I am back home. I still feel waves of depression a couple times a week, and am still conflicted in many ways (I don¿¿t understand what to do on so many levels), but grateful that I did not get permanently traumatized. Needless to say, this has been one of the worst years of my life, but this summer I¿¿m looking to change that. My mom says a therapist would help but frankly I don¿¿t see how. No one understands the situation I¿¿m, and no one can help me, unless they can remove all my financial worries and well as my stress. Well, I know that only you can really help yourself, and I¿¿ve already begun to feel better since being with the family. My main goal is to maintain a productive healthy lifestyle. I would be honored to represent Queens for another year and will not let you down I understand my grades were unsatisfactory, but if I could be given the chance to repeat the courses and fix it I would do it in a heartbeat. I want nothing more than to fix my mistakes and have many plans to achieve success in 3rd year. If there¿¿s anything you need me to do I swear I¿¿ll do it. One thing I¿¿m learning this summer is how to play piano. I already took my sister¿¿s piano (she doesn¿¿t use it anyway) and want to be able to play all my favourite songs, and I have a lot of favourites so there¿¿ll be plenty of time to practice I know you probably don¿¿t have the time to read through all this (it¿¿s already REALLY long, sorry) so I¿¿ll skim my summer goals to a few points: Gym, Good diet, Reading, Work, Friends and Meditation (I¿¿ve tried some here and there but I actually want to get good at it) and Gael training (hopefully). Fortunately I won¿¿t have time for any girls, mainly because one broke my heart a month ago. Oh well, I told her I liked her, it just made our friendship awkward and we still meet up and she updates me about other guys. My friends want me to stop seeing her but I can¿¿t stop being friends with her just because she doesn¿¿t like me :P. Anyways, onto the Academic Plan

PS: This has been all straight from my heart, thank you for taking the time to read all of this.