Please help me on the academic dismissal appeal letter

Parents Forum
1

Hello, I am a currently graduate student at ASU and has been recommended for dismissal because of my low overall GPA. Though my GPA has improved a lot during the probation period, I still failed to meet the GPA criteria of 3.0 (currently my GPA is 2.83). Would you give me some advice on the appeal letter? Attached is my draft of appeal letter.

Dear Committee,
I am writing to request an appeal of the dismissal decision. There were several factors that contributed to my current academic standing.

I admit I did not do well over the course of my first semester at ASU, and it showed in my grades as a result. I do not blame anyone but myself for the low GPA I received and I know I did not try the best of myself to overcome the bad habits. Over the first semester at ASU, my grades were significantly affected by my bad study habits and my playful heart. Being away from classes for a month becauseof my broken legs, I did not work hard to try to catch up with the lecture materials. This made me fall behind, and posed greater difficulty in learning advanced knowledge covered in the later time of semester. The another bad habit that lead to my failure is that I never ask for help from instructors orfellow students, because I was too shy to ask questions. Therefore, I did not understand the materials thoroughly. Also, I did not put my heart into study. I spent too much time travelled around thecountry during the first semester, and nearly forgot studying. In fact, being a good student requirestaking the study seriously. I failed to take it seriously, and undoubtedly failed the first semester.

On my return to ASU for Spring semester, I introspected myself and came with a mind set of I should take the study at the first priority. But that’s not enough. At the first half of the semester, I was sure that studying the one or two nights before an exam would give me enough time to absorb all ofthe information, but I was wrong. It came to my attention that I need time and a healthy body tostudy and concentrate on the material. Also, I know that one of my worst mistakes is that I did notrevise the lecture materials in time. For that reason, I planned to revise the lecture materials taughtin class at every weekend, and committed time to attend recitations and meet with my fellow studentsto discuss the problems that we did not understand through a week of study. Finally, I am glad to see my grades improved a lot after the Spring semester.

When I return to Summer semester, I undoubtedly will overcome the bad habits mentioned above. First of all, I will keep on asking questions and revising knowledge learned during a week. Secondly, Iam in progress of improving my body health and life habits so that I can fully concentrate on studyingat daytime. Thirdly, I will take the Mobile Computing course during summer since I have experiencesin developing mobile applications in the past, and I love this topic. I will challenge myself for passing it with an A and without a doubt, if I am granted another opportunity, it will be a challenge that Iam confident to accomplish.I am certain that if I am given a second chance, I will be persistent when facing with challenges that structure my skills which can be demonstrated through my grades. I have planned to discipline myself in every single aspect of my life because I do dream with my graduate school graduation and with that diploma from ASU.

Thank you for your time and consideration. I sincerely do hope I will return to ASU for Summer semester.

Sincerely,

2

I think that standards would be higher at grad school. This letter would be weak even for undergrad.

Can you explain about the broken legs? How did you travel with broken legs?

Are you a native English speaker? Your writing would seem to indicate not. Also I think you mean “review” not “revise.” And you do not “introspect yourself.” There are many examples throughout.

They have already given you a chance by putting you on probation, with a clear guide to how to pass probation, yet you did not manage to change your habits. I don’t think this will work, no matter how well written (or not).

Confessing that you forgot about studying etc. etc, certainly won’t help. If you insist on appealing, keep it short and sweet. Dear Committee, I am writing to appeal my dismissal from ASU, and request one more chance to prove a change in attitude that began to have results in Spring Semester this year (explain in one sentence). In the future, I plan on the following things to ensure I can continue to improve: (List). Thank you for your consideration.

In the future, if you are having problems, seek out help, seek accommodations, try to communicate before disaster not after.

This is not the end of the world. Take some time and reapply somewhere else. Your GPA will start over again though the transcript from ASU will always need to be disclosed. You have a bachelor’s. Get a job for a year or two, and give yourself time to mature. Many people go to school in their 30’s 40’s and even 50’s.

3

It’s too long. Get to the nuts and bolts. “I apologize for my poor performance. I was lazy and I messed up. (Yes, talk about your broken legs). I plan to do this,this, this and this if I am readmitted. I would be extremely grateful if you would reconsider my dismissal.”

You have tooooo many words in this. You just need to explain why you did poorly and apologize. Explain how you will be a better stduent. Ask them to reconsider and be humble. You are asking them for their forgiveness, basically. If you can, get a supplemental letter for a prof who likes you and submit that too. Good luck.

4

“Revise” is a European term for “study”.

We need more details…what happened that caused you to have broken legs?
Did you let anyone know at college that your legs were broken?
Do you understand in the US College system it is expected that you go to class when it meets?

The next semester you must have seen that your grades were not doing well…why didn’t you change anything?
If studying (revising) one or two days before the first test didn’t work…why would you do the same thing on the second?

A successful appeal must do several things:

  1. show that you understand what went wrong
  2. show that you take responsibility for the academic failures
  3. show that you have a plan for future academic success
  4. in a broad sense, show that you are being honest with yourself and the committee

Here are some examples:

http://collegeapps.about.com/od/Academic-Dismissals/a/Sample-Appeal-Letter-For-An-Academic-Dismissal.htm

Some of this is general, and some specific to your situation.

  1. search this topic on CC and you will see many other posts on academic appeals
  2. Make sure your letter states what the issue was that caused you to have academic difficulties
  3. Did you talk to your professors/dean of students about the issue?
  4. Did you make use of the many resources your school has? if not, why not?
  5. Find out what those resources are…e.g. counseling center, talking to professors, talking to your adviser, withdrawing from class, talking to dean, maybe taking incompletes,
  6. State how you would use those in the future
  7. How are you addressing what caused the issue? Have you addressed the depression?
  8. Think about if you should continue at college, or take a break.
  9. Think about if you should continue at a community college, to be close to your family
  10. How is your college funded? Will that continue?

In general, keep in mind what the college wants…they want students who can succeed. They need to know that you understand what the issue was, know now the resources that you can use, how the problems is resolved so you will not have academic issues in the future.

Here are strategies to do well in college…mention some of these in your letter.

  1. GO TO CLASS, BUY THE BOOK, READ THE CHAPTERS, AND DO THE HOMEWORK!

  2. Go to Professor’s office hours early in the semester and Ask this question: “I know this is a really difficult class-- what are some of the common mistakes students make and how can I avoid them?”

  3. If you have problems with the homework, go to Prof’s office hours. If they have any “help sessions” or “study sessions” or “recitations” or any thing extra, go to them.

  4. Form a study group with other kids in your dorm/class.

  5. Don’t do the minimum…for STEM classes do extra problems. You can buy books that just have problems for calculus or physics or whatever. Watch videos on line about the topic you are studying.

  6. Go to the writing center if you need help with papers/math center for math problems (if they have them)

  7. If things still are not going well, get a tutor.

  8. Read this book: How to Become a Straight-A Student: The Unconventional Strategies Real College Students Use to Score High While Studying Less by Cal Newport. It helps you with things like time management and how to figure out what to write about for a paper, etc.

  9. If you feel you need to withdraw from a class, talk to your advisor as to which one might be the best …you may do better when you have less classes to focus on. But some classes may be pre-reqs and will mess your sequence of classes up.

  10. For tests that you didn’t do well on, can you evaluate what went wrong? Did you never read that topic? Did you not do the homework for it? Do you kind of remember it but forgot what to do? Then next time change the way you study…there may be a study skill center at your college.

  11. How much time outside of class do you spend studying/doing homework? It is generally expected that for each hour in class, you spend 2-3 outside doing homework. Treat this like a full time job.

  12. At first, don’t spend too much time other things rather than school work. (sports, partying, rushing fraternities/sororities, video gaming etc etc)

  13. If you run into any social/health/family troubles (you are sick, your parents are sick, someone died, broke up with boy/girlfriend, suddenly depressed/anxiety etcetc) then immediately go to the counseling center and talk to them. Talk to the dean of students about coordinating your classes…e.g. sometimes you can take a medical withdrawal. Or you could withdraw from a particular class to free up tim for the others. Sometimes you can take an incomplete if you are doing well and mostly finished the semester and suddenly get pneumonia/in a car accident (happened to me)…you can heal and take the final first thing the next semester. But talk to your adviser about that too.

  14. At the beginning of the semester, read the syllabus for each class. It tells you what you will be doing and when tests/HW/papers are due. Put all of that in your calendar. The professor may remind you of things, but it is all there for you to see so take initiative and look at it.

  15. Make sure you understand how to use your online class system…Login to it, read what there is for your classes, know how to upload assignments (if that is what the prof wants).

  16. If you get an assignment…make sure to read the instructions and do all the tasks on the assignment. Look at the rubric and make sure you have covered everything.

  17. If you are not sure what to do, go EARLY to the professors office hours…not the day before the assignment is due.

5

Ah, sorry, learned something about “revise”.

I think the fact that the you were already on probation is significant. The only thing that can be emphasized is an upward trend toward the end.

Broken legs- did you get accommodations? Could you walk? Did you go to class or were you in the hospital? Did you tell anyone? How did you travel? Etc.

6

My habits were bad.
My habits were bad.
Undoubtedly I will improve.

You won’t convince them with this. Nor your work on “body health” or taking and getting an A in one course you “love,” (What about courses you don’t love?)

They don’t want to see a list of your mistakes. They know those. You need to show what has changed, actual results. I don’t see that. They don’t want to hear what you “will” do or "plan"to do. Probation was the period to fix this, turn it all around.

Not promises for the future.Rather, the successes you actually have. Then they can weigh.

7

Thanks for your detailed reply!
I failed the first semester so my GPA was 2.0. For the second semester I improved and my GPA was 3.6.
I will add more specific details about my failure in the first semester, and what has improved and changed during the second semester.

8

Thanks for your advice! I fell from my bike and my legs were seriously injured so that I couldn’t walk around. It took about a month for me to recover. I will disclose more details about this in my letter.

9

Thank you for your advice! I will add more specific details about the progress I made during the second semester.

10

Oh well that is a dramatic change in GPA and your barely missing the cutoff is a technicality. You have already shown that you have changed. Your letter does not get that across at all.

So: Dear Committee, I am writing to appeal my dismissal from ASU. I had a rough start at ASU, with a GPA of 2.0 (failing) due to an injury that prevented me from getting to class (is this true?). I should have sought help and accommodations.

However, for my second year, I achieved a 3.6 GPA, resulting in a cumulative GPA of 2.83, just under the cut off for dismissal. I achieved this by working hard, doing all the reading, reviewing it every weekend, using tutors, meeting in study groups (whatever, list what you did).

I am hoping that the dramatic increase in my GPA demonstrates that I am working hard and know how to succeed, and I am also hoping that you will give me another chance to do well so as to more than exceed the cutoff GPA.

With more info on the broken legs, we could help more. Did anyone at school know you could not walk? And what about traveling and your fun loving heart?

11

Yes, my room mates and my fellow students know I couldn’t walk, and I have records from our school clinic.

I traveled several times after my legs heal. So I spent too much time on things besides studying.

I just rewrote the letter to try to express my self more clearly, and I am going to meet advisor this afternoon. Thanks for your help!

12

Infact, the injury was not total preventing me from getting to school. But I didn’t know our school provide pick-up service for students. I didn’t ask help from school. My bad.

13

Good luck!