Submit an Academic Petition or Appeal

Petition Letter: To Whom It May Concern:

I am the first year Arts and Science student. I am writing to you to appeal an Credit Standing for my German 101 Beginner German course which I took last year in the fall term.

Because I strongly believe if I had not have experienced two extremely sever roommate conflicts and had not have trouble dealing with residence house admission thus I would not had sever mental suffering which directly affected my academic performance and have leaded me failed nearly all me exams in my very first semester at Queen¿¿s. I am an international student form China. I chose to come to Canada, to come to Queen¿¿s because I believe here at Queen¿¿s University I could have that chance to live my dream¿¿study economics and arts courses.

However, my beginning life at Queen¿¿s University was very unpleasant. After the first week of academic term, I had a conflict with my first roommate. For she deeply suspended me have had used her computer to log into her email and her social network accounts. No matter how much I clarified and proved myself I still could not reduce her mistrust. When residence dons stepped in into our conflict standing her side against me, I felt incredibly helpless and homesick. Later in that night, my roommate moved out. This conflict and my roommate reaction made me felt a strong sense of abandonment. I did not know a soul before I came to Canada. I am in a completely foreign country where courage is the passport when my old world disappeared. However, what I have experienced in the first two weeks in Canada is distrust, misleading, isolated and no body ever supported me in this foreign land. I was very upset by this event and I could not let it go at that time. Every time I tried to study and live back to the normal life, the whole conflict would flashback into my mind. When I was informed that I would be having a new roommate after two weeks my first roommate moved out. I was ecstatic since I thought I would have an amazing roommate to help me re-believe in this country and move on. However, that was the start of the nightmare. In her first day she moved in, she held a party at 3:00am and made out with her guy friend in our room completely ignored my existence. It was totally disrespectful not just to me but to residence rule. I called the front desk to ordered and maintained this issue. In return, every time I tried to study or to sleep in room she would turn on her music with speaker. I tried to conduct the roommate contract with my roommate, but she refused and claimed that she hate rules. I have morning classes at 8:30am everyday so I have to go to bed early to support my busy morning. I could not study well if I lack of sleep. Since we have incompatible timetable and cannot work out each other, I chose to quit and submitted a room change request. That was a painful process. I have to keep alarm with residence admission manager on the one hand and keep dealing issue with my roommate with another hand. I was tortured and fatigued physically and mentally and I had to hold my tongue to my parents because they do not speak English and could no help me except endlessly worried on me. During that a month waiting for a room change, I asked Sonja Simijanic, residence life coordinator, for help. But she could not relieve all of my disappointment and frustration. I tried to focus on my study but I kept distracted by my residence life. Finally I was placed a room in Adelaide. I asked the residence housing manager for the circumstance of the room before I accepted that room. I was told that the room is perfect. But what is true is that nobody wants to live in that room. Because the room is in between two toilets when people flash the toilet, an unbearable sound will echo in that room. Sometimes you can feel the whole room is trembling. I was waken by this sound at least 12 times a night and I could not even have a good rest in that room. This directly affected to all my study. I was extremely tired everyday for the sever lack of sleep and I even fell asleep on one of my mid-term. I asked for another room change and cannot emphasize enough how much I felt being cheated and frustrated. During another month and half waiting to a room where I can sleep, I slept in the Adelaide lobby or in the Stauffer. Because I was even more willing to be locked in the library for a good sleep rather than in an earthquake-trembling room with insufferable sound. During my days in Adelaide, my daily routine was went to lectures and then locked myself in the room crying. I asked Freeman, residence counseling, for help. But that did not help me at all. I desperately threw myself to study to forget what had happened to me. Nevertheless, every time when I opened a book all the memories come tumbling down to my mind. I cannot study while living in that dysfunctional life.
Finally, I changed to a new room and was able to live a new life in the last month of fall term. I studied hard from them and so far everything back to track. I changed to another mental counselor and joined the bounce back program. I worked very hard on every subject. I got an A in the first Econ assignment this semester and did well on all of my tests so far. I think if I did not encounter the dysfunctional life in first system I can get very good grades at least on my German course. Because language leaning is my strength. English is my second language and I went to public school. I have to learn English myself in order to study in an English speaking country. I got 7 on IELTS and 2100 on SAT exams without teachers. And my spoken English is also great. Also, I did well on my English lecture and can achieve average grades on English course at Queen¿¿s, in which tutorial I am the only student for whom English is not the first language. I also took French course in French Alliance for 6 months and I got the highest mark in the class. The German course that I took was very basic. If I ever had time to practice, I believe with ability of learning a new language, I could do well on German as well. Therefore, I think it would be fair to me to take Credit Standing for my German course.The reason for my late appeal is that I did not know about this program until my Math Professor Mr. Abelson who suggested me to appeal a CR for my math 121 and advised me to change a new mental counselor after known my hard experience.

Thank you so much for reading my appeal and thank for your understanding and consideration.


Kind Regards,
Juliet Yuxiao Li