How to fight back
The dos and don’ts of appealing an unsatisfactory grade
It’s inevitable: at some point in your academic career, you will receive a grade that you will be less than thrilled with. It might be of your own doing. Maybe you decided to throw a toga party the night before an exam, or skipped so many classes that when you showed up for a cameo appearance on the last day of school the professor asked: “And you are . . . ?” Yet a situation may arise where you feel convinced you’re the victim—where you just don’t deserve that crummy mark. In that case—before you go totally berserk—remember that you have the right to ask why you received the grade and, just as importantly, to take action if you disagree with the answer.
To understand your options and how best to proceed, take a lesson from one student’s attempt to change two failing grades. Tom (real name withheld for privacy) was in his second year at St. Francis Xavier University in Antigonish, N.S., when he went through one of those life experiences that can knock you off your feet for a while. After finishing his Christmas exams, Tom returned to his family home in northern Ontario, where his parents sat him down in the living room and told him that after 22 years of marriage they had decided to separate. Tom was stunned by the news, but he returned to Antigonish and resumed his studies, believing he could handle the turmoil and complete his academic year.
Upon returning, Tom sought counselling and even informed his professors about his family situation. But just when things were starting to improve as winter turned to spring, he received another blow: he logged onto his student account in May and discovered that he had failed two courses. “I got a 48 (per cent) in a history and an English course,” recalls Tom, “and they were both full-year courses.”
Beside the history mark was a note indicating that he could write a supplementary exam, so he accepted the option, wrote the exam three weeks later, and eventually received a passing grade. He wasn’t so lucky when it came to his English mark. After several emails to the professor went unreturned, he officially appealed the grade online by paying a $10 administration fee through his student account. “That was a mistake,” says Tom. “I should have spoken to the dean’s office first to see if there were any other options.” The professor told the dean’s office that she never received Tom’s final paper, which was worth 20 per cent of the term mark, and Tom was notified later in the summer that the appeal had been denied. (Tom is positive he submitted the final paper on time, but he had no way of proving it because he didn’t save the email—another mistake.)
Upon returning to school in the fall, Tom wanted to discuss the issue with the professor. But the professor was gone. As a last resort, he approached the dean to look into the matter one last time. But the dean turned out to be “not exactly the most accommodating person to deal with,” recalls Tom. He waited, and waited some more, but he never followed up with the dean. (Yet another mistake.) When the dean finally did get back in touch, he told Tom there was nothing he could do.
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Can I add to that: bring your questions to the person who graded your assignment in the first instance. In other words, if a TA gave you a a grade you’re unhappy with, speak to the TA about it first. Don’t bring it straight to the prof. That’s insulting to the TA, and a good prof will likely tell you go to see the TA about it in any case. Your prof also won’t be as well-equipped to give you feedback as the TA who marked your paper.
You know, I hate to be wet towel on this topic, but in my experience both as an advocate for students in the appeals and petitions structure and now as an adjunct lecturer myself, this is not the advice I would have students follow. “Find a sympathetic instructor” hit them with the “please I need to keep my scholarship” and the “come on, can’t you find a few more points for me…?” If a student approaches me with that attitude we are going nowhere – and I’ve never known it to work with anyone else either.
What’s wrong with this approach is that the entire attitude presupposes it is the instructor’s role to “find” grades for the student and to “help” the student to get the grade that the student wants, rather than to assign the grade the student has actually earned. And no instructor is going to react favourably to having that attitude thrown at them. It’s an abdication of the student’s own responsibility in the process. How can that reflect well on the student?
Now don’t get me wrong. There may be times when you want to talk about a grade. If, for example, you genuinely feel that something was graded badly (and I mean beyond the range of you want a couple more points) then sure, go through the steps. And if you really didn’t receive credit for something you submitted then hell yes, that’s grounds for any kind of appeal.
This article, however, reads like a mash up of all the worst student attitudes I’ve ever encountered. So “Tom” on the one hand claims that 20% of his grade was simply lost (and apparently he’s using some e-mail program so antiquated that it doesn’t even have a “sent” folder) and yet he’s still focused on how the professor should “find” him a couple of grades? I’m sorry, but much as I’m a student advocate, some stories just don’t hang together.
I’ve won very significant appeals on behalf of students. And yes, we’ve managed to erase failing grades. But outside of extremely rare and specific scenarios, the solution has never been to beg a professor to acknowledge your own particular specialness and to pretty please with cherries on top be a good chum and come through this one time…. That approach is insulting and denigrating to a professor’s role in the institution. If you have a good reason why something went wrong with your grading process then hell yeah, lay it on the table. But if you have a good reason then you shouldn’t fear the formal appeals process either.
Yes, most appeals fail. That’s because most should. But if you’ve got a solid point to make then yours doesn’t have to. And please, don’t tell students to avoid engaging the formal process at all costs. There are time limits to these things. And once you’ve passed deadlines, that’s just one more hurdle in the way of a successful appeal.
I agree with Jeff’s comment. The students mentioned in this article did not deserve any extra points. I understand Tom’s situation (coming from a broken family myself) but this is hardly an excuse for failing a year long course. What happened the rest of the year?
The problem is there will always be family and relationship problems during university and it is the student’s job to deal with it- and not make excuses. I work full time on top of going to school and have 1000 problems too. I seems to have to deal with much more stress then most other 20 y/o but it has not stopped me from having an A average without asking teachers for extensions or to up my grades. It makes me sick when other students manage to up their grades based on pity stories. Profs need to be harsher.
Great advice! I just spoke with my prof about a bad mark that I received on my mid-term paper and after telling her that I could, and would, do better she allowed me to do an additional assignment to raise my mark. Thanks!
Um, don’t go to U of T downtown.
Unbelievable. Macleans, shame on you.
If things are going sideways in your life, keep in contact with your instructors. We simply cannot evaluate your work relative to your social situation. Depression and anxiety can affect your judgement and your performance, but nobody gets a pass because their life is hard. What they get is maybe alternative opportunities to show what their best work really looks like. Create those for yourself.
Instructors also really really hate being told that you normally get a certain mark, so should get that same mark in their class. Or that you have a scholarship so should have your marks bumped. Or you’re trying to get into teacher’s college so you really really need those two extra points. I mean we *hate* it. If it’s looking like your scholarship or GPA might be threatened by your performance, go to the instructor with some humility. Explain to them your situation and ask how you can improve, what extra work or reading you could do, how you might create an opportunity to work harder, to get those two extra points you need.
Instructors want you to succeed, but we like to treated with the same respect you’d show your boss at Coffee Time. You don’t just walk into your shift manager’s office and say give me a raise, buddy, because I need a new Ipod. You demonstrate why your work is worth more, or ask how you can make it worth more.
And when you’ve failed to show up for work at all, you certainly don’t demand to be promoted, even if things at home are really sucking, right? Figure out what you think is reasonable in a work situation and apply it to school. University isn’t a haven from ‘the real world’ — it is the real world. Act accordingly.
Just wanted to add – there *are* times when you can be a victim of unfair grading – more often on subjective, essay-type work than on multiple-choice exames, etc. In these cases, a calm appeal to alternative authorities is in order.
Some red flags:
bad marks seem to cluster around social identities: white men, pretty girls, religious people, marxists, right-wingers, brown people, black people, old people, etc….
*everyone* in the class is complaining about a 25-45% drop in their GPAs under that prof.
your argument apparently falls apart in the section where you cite critics of your prof or his/her friends
your findings apparently fail in the section where you criticize the private funders of your project.
your work is entirely unintelligible in the part where it deviates from conventional forms.
comments in your paper say something like…”i’ve never really understood the value of this kind of feminist criticism…have you read ayn rand?”
or “can one really speak this to subject unless you are a (man, woman, black person, brown person, disabled person, etc?)
or “unless you’ve read the Geneology of Morals, I can’t really engage your discussion of morality”
or “there’s something extremely suggestive about your argument but i can’t make sense of it yet. why don’t you come over to my house -say – 11 pm on Friday – and we’ll discuss it further in front of the fireplace.”
in these cases, submit your work immediately to an official appeals process!