We get it, things don’t always go your way. Maybe you’ve been sick for the past few days, or you have two midterms and an assignment this week, or personal matters have got you too stressed to prepare well for that exam tomorrow. Don’t worry, everyone has been there before. You can thankfully seek accommodations for certain situations, and petitions are one of the primary ways of doing so.
“A petition is your formal request for an exception to a Faculty or University rule, regulation or deadline. The University of Toronto acknowledges that students sometimes encounter unforeseen or uncontrollable circumstances that can severely interfere with their ability to fulfill their academic obligations.”
Types of Petitions
The three types of petitions that you can submit are discussed below. For the most up-to-date information about petitions at U of T Engineering, visit this site – About Petitions.
Term Work Petition is applicable for term work such as, graded homework, midterms, quizzes, assignments, labs, etc. If you unavoidably missed a term work due to severe personal illness, personal or family crisis or other extenuating circumstances, you should discuss the matter with your instructor immediately. If necessary, you can submit a term-work petition through the Engineering Portal. The deadline to submit a term-work petition and the accompanying supporting documentation, if needed, is seven days after the missed or affected term work.
Any final exam petitions and accompanying documentation should be submitted within seven days of your last examination. Keep in mind that the final exam petition cannot offer you an exemption from writing an exam. Deferred exams and re-writes for courses are also not standard practice in the FASE. If the petition is approved, you will likely be assigned an assessed mark based on closely supervised term work as compared to the closely supervised term work the rest of the class in relation to their final examination performance.
When making a decision about submitting a final exam petition, you should consider how well you feel at the time of the exam, whether you can obtain supporting documentation for the petition, and how prepared you may feel for a possible later examination date. If you are having difficulties with a course, always speak with your professor/instructor. If they are unable to answer your questions, you should consult with your academic advisor.
Special Consideration Petition can be submitted to request exemption from a faculty regulation. If you need clarification on any rules or regulations in the Academic Calendar, you should reach out to your Academic Advisor. Since you have to provide sufficient reasoning for the exemption, it is also highly recommended that you discuss with your Academic Advisor before submitting a petition for special consideration.
Some of the reasons for submitting a petition are personal illness, illness or death of a close family member, personal or family crisis, or other extenuating circumstances. However, note that these are extenuating circumstances; petitions will not be granted due to personal carelessness. Note that U of T Engineering students may file one term-work petition per term without documentation (i.e. self-declare their own illness) for term-work valued at 14% or lower through the Engineering Portal. The petition may not cover term-work worth 15% or greater (without a Verification of Illness form) and cannot span a period longer than three calendar days.
Upper Year Insights
Some of you might feel like you don’t need petitions, or that petitions are an unfair advantage. Of course, petitions should only be submitted when absolutely necessary, and by the end of the term, you would have still submitted the same assignments and completed the same exams as everyone else (so a petition would leave theoretically leave more work for you in the future). However, you should never avoid petitions out of principle. Even if you have a 4.00 GPA, you can submit a petition; petitions don’t relate to your academic abilities. Your health and wellbeing always come first. If you have any questions about petitions, be sure to book an appointment with your Academic Advisor.