Submit an Academic Petition or Appeal

Petition Letter: Dear Associate Dean (Studies),


I am appealing for Credit Standing in MATH124 Online (Distance Studies) that I was enrolled in this summer, Summer 2018 June-August, and in which I received a letter grade of D+. I am filing this appeal as throughout the course I was receiving my usual and higher value grades for all assignments (85+) but, due to extenuating circumstances, was very ill prepared for the final exam and ended with a substantially lower grade in the course. To begin, I had moved the date of my original final exam in this course which was scheduled on August 1 to the makeup date of September. In addition, I also had to move the final exam date of my other summer course PHGY215 from August 2 to August 16. This original movement was due to physical illness in which I was experiencing dizziness and could not stay awake for long periods of time. This affected my schoolwork in that I could not focus on any task, whether schoolwork or cooking etc. and, in addition, had to stay home from my job for a few days. In this case, I notified my professor for MATH124, Alan Ableson, and also provided him with documentation (1) which I have attached as the first document in this appeal. This problem was regulated with medication in the following weeks to the original date of the final exam and I was feeling more physically prepared to write on the makeup date.

However, the appeal I am writing today has to do with my performance on the MATH124 final exam scheduled on the makeup date of September 9. I am not a stranger to having to move an exam for intense anxiety attacks as I have been diagnosed with Generalized Anxiety Disorder for some time (3 years) and struggled with finding the best treatment for me. Luckily, I was progressing and have been registered with QSAS for about a year (attached as document 2). Unfortunately, at the beginning of this summer (end of May-beginning of June) this anxiety that was well-managed became extremely unbearable after the turns of a very personal event and began to progress into panic attacks that I had never experienced before. This led to me seeking the help of Dr. Cheng, a psychiatrist at Queen's Student Wellness Services. With the help of Dr. Cheng, I was able to regulate these new symptoms fairly well for the remainder of the summer and perform very well in my PHGY215 class and majority of my MATH124 class, as I normally would. The extenuating circumstance which lead to my extreme poor doing on my MATH124 exam was the escalation of these panic attacks into more extreme attacks in which I was a harm to myself during the weeks of August 20th and 27th leading to a final event on the weekend of September 1-3 (documents 3 and 4 to be uploaded soon). At this time, I decided to increase my therapy visits and include Dr.Lavigne so that I would be visiting both her, and Dr. Cheng once a week. I also had decided it was in my best interest to return home for the remainder of the summer before beginning school in the fall and thus, had decided to still write my final MATH124 exam. Due to my consistent panic attacks, low mood and heightened anxiety I was finding it very difficult to focus on my course materials the week following Sept 1-3 up until my exam on September 9. Having already moved my exam once I was quite certain that it wouldn't be possible to move again and if so, that I would not be able to return home as I needed in order to take a mental rest. Finally, I wrote my exam on September 9 and left the majority of the pages blank while also leaving the exam early as I felt as though I had absolutely no focus on the subject in front of me and was mentally exhausted. Immediately following my exam I left Kingston to mentally prepare for the upcoming schoolyear (although not able to fully return home) and notified Alan Ableson of my concern with my performance on the exam.

Immediately following the weeks of August 20- September 3, I continued with bi-weekly therapy sessions with both Dr. Cheng and Dr. Lavigne and have been doing so up until today, September 24. Luckily, I am making great progress and will be returning to my usual therapy for once a week for the remainder of the school year. I believe that with the tools I have learned from this consistent therapy along with the weekly therapy checkups and my registration with QSAS that events like this will be avoided in the future.

Sincerely,

Taylore Dodd