Submit an Academic Petition or Appeal

Petition Letter: Friday, January 18th, 2019

Dr. Jenn Stephenson
Queen¿¿s University
Student Services, Dunning Hall, 1st Floor
94 University Avenue
Kingston, ON
K7L 3N9

Dear Dr. Jenn Stephenson,

My name is Aidan J. Reigber and I am a first year student who was enrolled in CISC101: Elements of Computer Science during the Fall 2018 term. Within this course, there is a rule that states one must attain a mark of at least 50 on the final exam in order to pass the course, regardless of the mark one achieves during the semester. I am writing to you today in order to appeal this rule, due to my extenuating circumstance that was beyond my control and debilitated my academic performance during the exam. The extenuating circumstance that I faced with before and during the exam was anxiety and panic attacks.

When I was studying for the exam, I had a constant feeling of anxiety, as well as continuous panic attacks that would last for the duration of the study session. As a first year, I didn¿¿t know any better and thought it was just the ¿¿first exam of university jitters¿, thinking it would diminish when it came time to write the exam. However, when I wrote the exam, I lost control, and my anxiety took over. With that being said, my anxiety lasted the whole exam, up until the very last second.

During high school, I worked very hard to earn good marks, which resulted in me achieving the Scotiabank Scholarship. This scholarship was only given out to 20 students across the nation and consisted of being given 2,000 each year during my undergraduate program, with the condition of passing all of my courses. The thought that failing my exam would lead to a failure of the course resulting in the loss of my 8,000 scholarship, took over my mind during the exam. I have never experienced anxiety this bad, as it felt like it was completely taking over my life, which affected how I performed on the exam. Additionally, the factor that led me to bad anxiety affecting me during this exam, and not the exams in my other courses, was this looming fact in my mind, that if I fail the exam, I automatically fail the course.

The reason this scholarship meant so much to me, and the reason that losing it was unbearable, was due to the fact that my family isn¿¿t the wealthiest. In my family, I have to pay for most of my education, so this scholarship would have been of significant benefit. I feel that it is truly unjust that I have lost this scholarship and the course itself after all of my hard work, just because of a bad spurt of uncontrollable anxiety during the three-hour exam period. If this rule of needing to pass the exam in order to pass the course was not in place, I would have finished the course with a 61, after attaining a 40 on my final exam. However, because of the rule, I ended up failing the course all together. To add, I worked extremely hard all semester through attending each class, taking good notes, doing well on assignments, attending office hours weekly and even getting a 71 on the class midterm examination (I have attached my completed assignments and work from the semester). It is really disheartening and discouraging that my whole term was reflected from a 3-hour exam, and that since I experienced bad anxiety, my mark was not reflected upon correctly.

In terms of a future plan, I am currently trying to improve my mental health, and learn of different ways to deal with my anxiety/panic attacks so this does not happen again in the future. With that being said, I have an appointment booked with an experienced counsellor at Queen¿¿s Student Wellness Services on Tuesday, January 29th, 2019 at 3:30pm. I am hoping that talking with a professional can ensure that this experience will never occur again, thus allowing me to succeed during my time here at Queen¿¿s University.

Thank you so much for your time and consideration while reading my letter.

Yours Sincerely,

Aidan J. Reigber
20122458
18ajr@queensu.ca