Submit an Academic Petition or Appeal

Petition Letter: Dear Associate Dean,

I am writing this today to ask to appeal my second-year grades (2016-2017) to become Credit Standing on my transcript because of the extenuating circumstances I endured. I went through a period of very bad mental health that affected my life in all aspects, especially my academic performance. I did not know at the time I could appeal my grades, so I am also appealing the time limit. Since the end of second year, I have felt very discouraged about my academic career as my GPA is now very low, until I spoke with an academic advisor in the summer of 2018. When reviewing my transcript, she told me it was very apparent that I had difficulties during my second year and encouraged me to write this appeal to see if anything could be done after I explained my situation.

In my first year I had struggled with my mental health and adjusting to being at university, but I managed to still do well as a result of the support systems in place in residence. When second year started (2016-2017), my mental health deteriorated as a result of personal circumstances and progressively got worse as the year went by. My acute mental illness developed physically, and it became harder for me to do simple everyday tasks. I could not get out of bed most mornings or perform daily hygiene. My illness affected my sleep schedule and I would either oversleep or not sleep at all. This affected my attendance, and I missed the majority of my lectures as well my mandatory tutorials. In addition, my appetite was impacted, and I did not eat properly during this time. As someone who took school seriously, I struggled with doing poorly in my classes. I had often tied my sense of self-worth to my intelligence and felt I was failing my family. I worried telling my parents how much I was struggling as they worked hard to pay for my education. I spoke to my doctor in early Fall 2017 and mentioned my struggles with my mental illness, I believed at the time that my symptoms would not worsen. Thus, I did not I did not consider revaluating my course load during the drop period because I thought this struggle was temporary. As my mental illness became worsened, it was past the drop period and I did not feel I could drop any of my courses, as I was afraid of how my parents would react and guilt that I would be wasting their money. My mental illness slowly became more and more debilitating. I would go through periods where I felt so sad, I could not physically get myself to complete assignments by their deadlines, and would struggle to submit them at all, even though I knew I was losing marks each day. Upon the risk of failing my courses, this turned into severe anxiety of everything related to school. I had several panic attacks and would become so anxious I could not even do simple tasks such as checking my school email or ONQ without anxiety taking over. The accumulating stress of everything I was doing wrong added further to my anxiety, which made it harder to ask for help. Fortunately, when I went home during winter, my parents noticed a change in not only my appearance but my way of being. They urged me to see my doctor and talk to someone, my family doctor recommended programs for me to get help in February 2017. Unfortunately, I could not afford it at the time, thus causing me to have to wait until summer.

In second semester, I still struggled immensely. I still could not attend the majority of my classes or sleep regularly. I would stay home for days on end and be unable to care for myself physically. I began slowly working on my mental health by speaking with a peer counsellor and opening up to those closest to me. I researched if transferring was possible and debated whether I was able to finish my degree at all. I truly felt like I was drowning and felt lucky to simply not have failed anything the whole year. I blamed myself for not being able to complete simple tasks or succeed in school which made it hard to reach out to my professors as I felt, at the time, it was my own fault for struggling.

That summer, I was able to start my recovery by attending Mindfulness Therapy to work on my anxiety and mental health. Slowly I started to improve, although still struggled in third year, I have learned ways to manage. In 2017-2018 school year, I became a Residence Don in order to help other students through the difficulties of first year. In training me to be a support for students, Residence life has helped me learn how to better take care of myself, as well as are a big support system and resource for my mental health. My grades steadily improved in third year.
I have returned this academic year to my position as Residence Don and am in a much better place. I still struggle sometimes but I believe that I am capable of succeeding in academia.

My grades continue to improve, my GPA has risen from a 2.28 at the end of 2016-17 school year to a 2.57 in Fall 2018. I now take a reduced course load which has helped me balance and I plan to take an additional year to further improve my grades. I am hopeful for my future but unfortunately my second-year grades have limited my options for graduate school. I ask that my grades be changed to Credit standing so that my future is not impacted and so I can hopefully be accepted into the graduate program of my choosing, without my second-year grades impeding my chances.