Faculty Senate petitions are for students who are deserving of amendments to their academic records via retroactive actions, such as retroactive withdrawals or late-drops, retroactive late-adds, or any other retroactive academic administrative actions. In all cases, the petitions must be based on extenuating circumstances outside of your control.
There are two types of Senate petitions that we see most often:
- Retroactive withdrawal for a past semester (or semesters)
- Retroactive late-drop of a course (or courses) from a current or past semester
How to submit a Faculty Senate Petition?
The first step is to discuss the retroactive action with your academic adviser to review any impact an approved petition would have on your student status or academic progress. The second step is to email the Ryan Family Student Center at studentcenter@ems.psu.edu for guidance on creating the petition.
Important tenets of a successful petition
- Brevity: concise and brief; grammatical correctness
- Supporting documentation (letters, emails, medical documents, other)
- A viable and reasonable case that is founded on extenuating circumstances outside of your control
Reasons that will jeopardize approval for a petition
- The course was too hard"; "I was not mature enough to appreciate my education"; "I just stopped attending class"; "I don't need this class to graduate"; "this impacted my GPA negatively"; "I need to raise my GPA"
- An excuse for which you have no tangible written proof; a case that is solely about lost scholarship support with no extenuating circumstances present; unjustifiable request for removal of poor work from years past
Acceptable reasons for retroactive requests
- Death in the family
- Personal or family crisis/situation
- Emotional upheaval/breakdown
- Financial worries/burdens
- Illness or disability (either mental or physical)
Petition Letters
For instructions on drafting a student petition letter, please visit https://senate.psu.edu/students/petitions/student-petition-letter/.
How to Submit
Please submit all materials to Kayla Pedmo
Ryan Family Student Center
14 Deike Building
University Park, PA 16802
Email: kbs183@psu.edu
She will provide your academic transcript, plus the needed Penn State forms for withdrawal or add/drop and will proxy your signature. (The $6.00 late add/drop fee will be deducted from your student account, if a late drop or late add petition is granted.)
DO NOT submit your petition materials directly to the Senate.
Submitting to Faculty Senate will greatly impede the process.
Other Petitions
Retroactive Registration (for an entire semester--often the result of failure to pay a semester bill) does NOT require a petition unless it has been more than nine months since the requested semester is over or you did not schedule any classes or you cancelled your registration. See the Registrar's website for details: https://www.registrar.psu.edu/registration/.
Retroactive Late Add (usually granted): The student must provide a formal petition letter and an email from the course instructor citing the grade earned. I will supply both the Grade Change form and Add-Drop form. Your letter will need to explain why you did not register for course in the given semester.