Submit an Academic Petition or Appeal

Petition Letter: Dear Associate Dean of the Queens University Arts and Science Faculty,

I am writing this appeal letter for the course LLCU432 as part of the Semester in Shanghai program I attended this past Fall 2014 term. The LLCU432 course is a 6.0 unit Field Research Practicum in which students will receive a regular Queen's letter grade as stated when we initially signed up for the program as well as currently on the Experience the Future, Queen's Semester in Shanghai website. The other three electives one may choose as graded as pass/fail like bilateral exchange programs. We are told and understood that the LLCU432 course will be graded based on the Queen's marking scale that we are used to back home at Queen's University. However, myself, as well as other students in this course noticed that our grade on SOLUS does not reflect our actual mark based on the Queen's marking scheme. My current grade on SOLUS for LLCU432 is an A. I asked Professor Miller to clarify on my mark and he gave me the breakdown as such:

Collaboration: 5/5
Proposal: 18.4/20
Journal: 18.5/20
Final Presentation: 22.5/25
Final Report 27.6/30

Final Mark: 73.5/100

These marks are already in consideration of different weights as for instance, the collaboration component corresponds with being worth 5 of my grade, proposal with 20, journal 20, final presentation 25, and final report 30. However, as evident, these numbers do not add up to my final mark of 73.5 and instead, should add up to 92/100, which corresponds to a 92, or an A on the Queen's marking scale. As this course involved being paired up and working together with a Fudan student, we were told that we were supposed to get the same mark. The Professor teaching the LLCU432 course as Fudan told us that it is their policy that only 30 of the students are able to obtain an A grade and that the highest mark at Fudan is an A, as A does not exist. Therefore, grades are curved in order to satisfy this requirement. However, my partner told me that she too, received an A grade. This means that despite how the curve may have affected our marks (which it should not, as we are supposed to be marked based on the Queen's scheme and be unaffected by the Fudan marking system), with a 92, I should be receiving an A. I proceeded to email Professor Miller with my problem stating that:

Thank you for your prompt response. I just wondering whether you could help clarify my mark on SOLUS. I received an A as my grade for the field research course on SOLUS but the added up weighted total is a 92 which I believe should correspond to an A at Queen's I understand that my partner at Fudan also received an A letter grade but they do not have A's there.

The response that I received from Dr. Miller was:

I reviewed everyone's papers individually in order to determine the final Queen's grade. In the case of people who received a Fudan A, not everyone's paper met the exceptionally high standard for an A at Queen's.

Professor Miller was not in attendance of any of the lectures of LLCU432 except for I believe the first and last, and I believe that to base our final grades on the final paper (the only component he saw), is unreasonable, especially as it is not worth 100 of our grade. Furthermore, my final report received a mark of 27.6/30, or 92 prior to Dr. Miller's grading. Although I am not necessarily able to critique my paper as of exceptionally high standard or otherwise, the fact is that my overall mark of both the final report and of the added up components, is 92, or an A based on the Queen's grading scheme.

I have worked hard in this course and I believe I should be marked fairly, objectively, and following the Queen's University scale as specified. I would appreciate a re-evaluation of my overall mark based on the raw component grades I was given. It is important to me that my grade is calculated accurately, based on the addition of the components, and is a genuine reflection of my performance in the course.

Thank you for your time,


April Cheng
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