Submit an Academic Petition or Appeal

Submission Number: 12483
Decision Date: February 3, 2025
Associate Dean: Jenn Stephenson, Ph.D.
Student Name: Edlira Ballaj
Student Email: edliraballaj07@gmail.com

Course: CHEM 281
Term: Fall
Year: 2023
Category: Request credit (CR) standing in a course or courses
Instructor: John Carran

Course: CHEM 282
Term: Winter
Year: 2024
Category: Request credit (CR) standing in a course or courses
Instructor: John Carran

Course: MICR 221
Term: Winter
Year: 2024
Category: Request credit (CR) standing in a course or courses
Instructor: Christopher Lohans, Bruce Banfield

Course: BCHM 218
Term: Summer
Year: 2024
Category: Request credit (CR) standing in a course or courses
Instructor: Douglas Quilty

Dear Edlira,

Thank you for your petition regarding Credit Standing in CHEM 281 (F23), CHEM 282 (W24), MICR 221 (W24) and BCHM 218 (S24). I have carefully reviewed your request and the supporting documentation that you supplied, and while I’m unable to grant your petition, I want to assure you that I’ve taken your circumstances into account as part of this decision.

According to the Academic Appeal and Petition Regulation 3.3.1.4. Credit standing is reserved for a course in which a student who has completed all of the work of the class, including the final examination, and achieved a passing grade in the class, but due to illness or other extenuating circumstances beyond their control, earned a substantially lower grade than might have been expected.

I acknowledge the severity of the extenuating circumstances that occurred in the neighbourhood that you were living in during the 2023/2024 academic year, as confirmed within the documentation that you supplied. I have however denied this petition request as the academic impacts on your individual grades in these specific courses are not clear. Looking at your transcript, I see similar final grades in other science courses from previous terms and I also see that you were able to achieve high grades in other classes during the 2023/2024 academic year despite these extenuating circumstances.

I want to remind you that it is the student’s responsibility to pause and evaluate the impact of extenuating circumstances on their classes prior to the drop deadline of the term. If they have fallen behind in a course or find the material too difficult, they should drop the course by the deadline. The drop deadlines, as they have been outlined in the “Important Dates” section on the Arts and Science web page, have been established by the Faculty of Arts and Science to ensure fair and equitable treatment of all students.

If you are concerned with the impact that these courses have on your GPA, I would suggest that you consider repeating them in a future term. When repeating the exact same course code, both attempts will appear on your transcript however, only the higher grade will be included within the calculation of your cumulative GPA.

Additionally, if you wish to appeal this decision, information on the appeal process and deadlines is available at queensu.ca/artsci/undergraduate/student-services/academic-petitions-and-appeals (click on “Second Level”). The Office of the University Ombudsperson offers guidance on student rights and procedural fairness at

queensu.ca/ombuds/appeal-process/procedural-fairness, and they are also available to support you at queensu.ca/ombuds.

I hope that you continue to seek out the support and resources available to you, and I wish you the best in navigating your next steps.

Warm regards,

Jenn Stephenson, Ph.D.
Associate Dean (Academic)