Petition Letter
Dear Dr. Bénard,
I am appealing for two of my fall 2014 grades to be credits as opposed to the grades they are now. These courses are ECON 255 and STAT 263 in which I received the grades of D+ and D respectively.
Since late summer of 2014, I have been dealing with a lot of different situations. First off, I am not in the program I originally planned to be in (Drama) because my parents forced me to major in Economics as opposed to Drama. I decided to honor my parents' wish and study economics. This became hard very fast. At the same time, my living situation was terrible because I got bullied in my own home. I could not come home most of the time for fear of what my housemates would do or say so I stayed in the library till very late at night or over at my then partner's house. Dealing with that on top of my usual state of anxiety and depression was very difficult and I had a hard time coping with anything. I took numerous trips to LaSalle in hopes of finding a remedy, a means of coping, or finding someone to talk to. In the past, I had tried various antidepressants and my body did not respond well to those. I finally got an appointment with a counsellor- Dr. McNevin and we had a chat. I did not feel like this session was helpful and felt like he did not really understand my problems so I did not go back.
Around this same time, my parents found out that I am gay. They made threats to pull me out of school and to estrange me from the family. They even proposed that I should switch to another university. So I told them I no longer talked to my friends and I was trying to be heterosexual so that they will stop the threats and eventually fulfil them. They found out again closer to the end of the semester and completely cut off all contact with me. The only contact I had with my family was through my older sister and the occasional time I could talk to my little sisters when my parents were not present.
All this was very stressful to deal with and I tried to deal with it all on my own because I did not think anyone would understand. My parents have contacted me since only to ask about my tuition fees. Although, I have learned to cope with this and am getting better mentally, I still have my bad days.
I did not appeal sooner because I did not think my grades were suffering because of these specific reasons. I just thought I was bad at math and economics and appealing would not be fair to those who actually had a case. Looking back at my transcript now, I can clearly see that second year was my worst year and this is definitely because of all the stresses I was dealing with. I have attached a supporting document of proof that I went to seek help and counselling and although not a strong reference, I also have a letter my older sister wrote outlining the issues I went through.
I am currently trying to improve my Economics GPA so that I am able to graduate this year. I have 0.042 more to just meet the requirement. My regular GPA is fine but I am striving to increase both. I am currently enrolled in ECON 262 with hopes to get a grade of C or above which will help me meet my graduation criteria. Without this grade or being able to get credits in the aforementioned courses, I am afraid I will be unable to graduate. I am doing my best to stay grounded, focused and on top of all my studies this year. I am also going to seek help again at Student Wellness Services with hopes of getting a different counsellor who might understand or empathize with some of my struggles. This will definitely keep me from going downhill again.
Thank you so much for taking the time to read my letter. I really appreciate it.
Sincerely,
Yvonne Ehinlaiye- 10051065
I am appealing for two of my fall 2014 grades to be credits as opposed to the grades they are now. These courses are ECON 255 and STAT 263 in which I received the grades of D+ and D respectively.
Since late summer of 2014, I have been dealing with a lot of different situations. First off, I am not in the program I originally planned to be in (Drama) because my parents forced me to major in Economics as opposed to Drama. I decided to honor my parents' wish and study economics. This became hard very fast. At the same time, my living situation was terrible because I got bullied in my own home. I could not come home most of the time for fear of what my housemates would do or say so I stayed in the library till very late at night or over at my then partner's house. Dealing with that on top of my usual state of anxiety and depression was very difficult and I had a hard time coping with anything. I took numerous trips to LaSalle in hopes of finding a remedy, a means of coping, or finding someone to talk to. In the past, I had tried various antidepressants and my body did not respond well to those. I finally got an appointment with a counsellor- Dr. McNevin and we had a chat. I did not feel like this session was helpful and felt like he did not really understand my problems so I did not go back.
Around this same time, my parents found out that I am gay. They made threats to pull me out of school and to estrange me from the family. They even proposed that I should switch to another university. So I told them I no longer talked to my friends and I was trying to be heterosexual so that they will stop the threats and eventually fulfil them. They found out again closer to the end of the semester and completely cut off all contact with me. The only contact I had with my family was through my older sister and the occasional time I could talk to my little sisters when my parents were not present.
All this was very stressful to deal with and I tried to deal with it all on my own because I did not think anyone would understand. My parents have contacted me since only to ask about my tuition fees. Although, I have learned to cope with this and am getting better mentally, I still have my bad days.
I did not appeal sooner because I did not think my grades were suffering because of these specific reasons. I just thought I was bad at math and economics and appealing would not be fair to those who actually had a case. Looking back at my transcript now, I can clearly see that second year was my worst year and this is definitely because of all the stresses I was dealing with. I have attached a supporting document of proof that I went to seek help and counselling and although not a strong reference, I also have a letter my older sister wrote outlining the issues I went through.
I am currently trying to improve my Economics GPA so that I am able to graduate this year. I have 0.042 more to just meet the requirement. My regular GPA is fine but I am striving to increase both. I am currently enrolled in ECON 262 with hopes to get a grade of C or above which will help me meet my graduation criteria. Without this grade or being able to get credits in the aforementioned courses, I am afraid I will be unable to graduate. I am doing my best to stay grounded, focused and on top of all my studies this year. I am also going to seek help again at Student Wellness Services with hopes of getting a different counsellor who might understand or empathize with some of my struggles. This will definitely keep me from going downhill again.
Thank you so much for taking the time to read my letter. I really appreciate it.
Sincerely,
Yvonne Ehinlaiye- 10051065