General 

 

Grade reappraisals are not petitions in the formal sense and are not accompanied by the standard petition forms. While Faculties may have general rules for grade reappraisals, each Department has a separate form, separate deadlines, and separate procedures. It is important to note that your grade appeal is made directly to the department the course concerned is in. The one rule they will all follow is that grades may be raised, lowered, or remain the same upon reappraisal. Whatever the decision, you are then stuck with it.  

 

Following are some general rules as declared by Senate. 

1. Students may, with sufficient academic grounds, request that a final grade in a course be reappraised (which may mean the review of specific pieces of

tangible work). Non-academic grounds are not relevant for grade reappraisals; in such cases, students are advised to petition to their home Faculty. Students are normally expected to first contact the course director to

discuss the grade received and to request that their tangible work be reviewed. Tangible work may include written, graphic, digitized, modeled, video recording or audio recording formats, but not oral work. 

2. In the event that students are still not satisfied with the final grade or the course director is not available to review the work, they may submit in writing a formal request for a grade reappraisal to the department or unit in which

the course is offered*. The Senate approved deadline for submitting grade reappraisals is within three weeks of the release of final grade reports in any term. Exercising discretion about minor delays in meeting the deadline which result from slow mail delivery or extraordinary circumstances are reasonable.  

 * The exceptions are as follows:

* for  Osgoode, Schulich, and the Faculty of Education the requests for reappraisals are submitted to the office of the respective Associate Dean

3. If the condition of sufficient academic grounds has been met, the relevant department committee, Department Chair, Associate Dean or Undergraduate Programme Director will be responsible for ensuring that the work is reappraised by an appropriate faculty member, ensuring anonymity of both the student and the reappraiser, and for communicating the result of the reappraisal (including the reappraiser's comments) and the route of appeal to both the student and the course director. The reappraiser will be given the nature of the assignment and the rationale for the original grade. It is expected that every effort will be made to render the decision within 30 days of the reviewer having received the work.  

4. Parties to the decision may appeal a negative decision on a request for a reappraisal, or the result of the reappraisal itself to a Faculty-level appeals committee in the Faculty in which the course is offered. However, this may only be done on the grounds of procedural irregular- ity. Procedural irregularity is defined as actions taken or not taken by a Department, Faculty, its officers, commit-

tees, or members with respect to the previous disposition of the case which violate or nullify one or all of the following:  

a) normal and written procedures of the University, Faculty, or Department concerned; 

b) consistency in the Faculty or Department's handling of cases substantially similar to that being appealed; 

c) principles of equity, natural justice or fairness, whether or not such violation occurred in accordance with written or customary procedures. Appeals based on allegations of these last procedural irregularities should allege and demonstrate obvious bias or other misbehaviour on the part of the officers or agents of the University and for which redress was not provided by an authority which

considered the case prior to the appeal.  

Appeals must be submitted within 21 days of notification of the decision. Faculty committees may waive that deadline when special circumstances are established by the appellant. No member of the Faculty committee shall consider an appeal if s/he considered the matter at an earlier level. At the discretion of the Faculty committee, the student and/or the faculty member may be invited to meet with the Committee to present his/her case orally. The Committee's decision will be taken in camera and it is expected that parties will be informed of the decision in writing within 30 days of the filing of the appeal.  

The following breakdown by Faculty simply expands on the previous guidelines: 

A candidate in a pre-service or in-service course may request a reappraisal of a grade by making a formal request to the Associate Dean of the respective Department, within fourteen days of the release of the final grade report. The request must be in writing and should state clearly why you believe that the grade should be re-evaluated. Where written work is to be reappraised, they will only accept the original version handed in to, and marked by, the instructor. The Associate Dean may seek the advice of independent reviewers and should consult with the Course Director involved. In the case of a practicum grade being reassessed the host teacher or adjunct professor may also be consulted before any grade change is made.  

 

Example of  a request for a grade reappraisal

"I am petitioning for a grade reappraisal of an assignment in ED 0000. 00 which I completed in the fall/winter semester 2003/04."

Your request for reappraisal should include the following information and documentation: 

Name of the Course Director of the course in question, a copy of the course outline, any handouts regarding completion times for the assignment being reassessed, the original copy of the assignment (the grade will be removed before the assignment is read by another professor).  

If the reassessment is for a practicum grade, also include the name of the Adjunct Professor, the Host Teacher or Host Teacher with special responsibilities, and all Adjunct Professor and Course Director written evaluations.

For all work other than final grades, if you are displeased with your mark it is expected that you shall discuss it with the person who marked your work within two weeks of receiving the mark. It may then be remarked with the results being that the mark may remain the same, be raised, or lowered. If you are not after speaking with your Instructor or Teaching Assistant you may, where appropriate, approach the Course Director who will decide whether or not to reappraise the work.  

If you wish to have final grades reappraised you must submit your request to the FES Undergraduate Office on the approved form within 21 days of the release of the final grade. The route of your reappraisal then will depend on what you wish to have reappraised and for what reasons. Course Directors may do the reappraisals themselves or may recommend to the Undergraduate Program Director someone else who is qualified to do so. Final authorization is given to the Program Director.  

 

Appeal Process 

1. If you are still not satisfied with the reappraisal of your final grade, both you and the Course Director and shall discuss it with the Undergraduate Program Director who may or may not arrange for another reappraisal.  

2. If you are still not satisfied you may appeal by petition, clearly stating your grounds, to the BES Program and Admissions Subcommittee using a form available from the Undergraduate Office. The Subcommittee will deal with your petition at its next meeting. The procedures for dealing with petitions are not officially laid out, except to state that any member of the subcommittee who is involved in the petition shall not be a part of either the discussion or the decision-making process. If you are not satisfied with the outcome of this stage you may appeal only to the FES Appeals  Committee on grounds of procedural irregularity.  

A written request for reappraisal may be made to the Chairperson of the Department or division in which the course is offered within three weeks of the release of the final grades, and you should state clearly in your request the reasons why your work warrants a higher mark.  

Reappraisals are dealt with by the Chair of the Department or the Course Director, in consultation with members of the staff. You, along with the Office of Student Programs, will be notified of the results within three weeks of the appeal.  

1. First you must complete reappraisal procedures at the teaching unit level within 21 calendar days of the release of the final grade in the course. Each department has different procedures and you must pick up the grade reappraisal form at the Department Office for the course involved.  

2. You may challenge the mark on specific pieces of work, or the overall course grade. Normally, however, only written work can be reassessed. However, if 

you have a low participation mark and have had full attendance you should still launch a challenge.  

3. If you are not successful at the Department level you may appeal to the Faculty Executive Committee. The appeal must be filed to the secretary of the Executive Committee within 15 working days of notice of denial of

your grade reappraisal. This may be waived under extreme circumstances. 

4. Your appeal must be typed and limited to four double spaced pages.  

5. You need to state the specific decision being appealed, the specific grounds on which the decision is being appealed, and provide all evidence to support

your appeal.  

6. If the Committee defers decision to get more information, both yourself and the teaching unit will be informed.  

7. Any person who is in a conflict of interest or who also heard the case at the teaching unit level will remove herself or himself from the process.  

 

Grounds for appeal: 

Appeals are only considered in cases of procedural irregularity or new evidence. Normally only appeals based on reappraisals of written work can be considered, though the Committee will not re-evaluate your work. At the discretion of the committee either yourself or the faculty member may be invited to present to the committee. Favourable decisions will generally mean a referral back to the teaching unit with instructions for reconsideration of the case.  

Appeals of the Executive Committee's decision may only be made to the Senate Appeals Committee on grounds of new evidence or procedural irregularity. Notice of Appeal must be submitted within 30 days of receipt of Faculty's decision.  

You may appeal a grade in SSB on only one of two grounds: 

• A clerical error has resulted in the miscalculation of your grade
• Your original grade did not fairly represent your work according to the marking system outlined by the instructor

Deadlines: 

Your grade appeal must be submitted within thirty days of the official grade release. 

Procedure: 

1. If you are not successful after going through all the informal processes to resolve your grade appeal, you must submit a formal written appeal to the Appeals Officer. The Appeals Officer is the Associate Dean, Academic or in their absence the Director of your degree program. Should both these individuals be absent, the Dean of the Schulich School of Business will act as the Appeals Officer.  

2. The Appeals Officer will attempt first to resolve the matter informally by approaching both yourself and the instructor. If the appeal is resolved at this level, the Appeals Officer will notify both yourself and the instructor of the results in writing.  

3. If the above steps are not successful, the Appeals Officer is empowered to require submission of all relevant documents including final examination, term examinations, homework assignments, reports, papers and the instructor's grade book as well as other documents identified as pertaining to your grade. Instructors are required to retain all such documents not returned to

the student for a period of one autumn or winter term after the end of any course's active term. The Appeals Officer, yourself and the instructor shall be allowed access to all such documents pertaining to your grades.  

4. The Appeals Officer is authorized to request assistance in appraisal of these documents. First the request shall be made to the coordinator of the area in which the course was taught or the coordinator's representative, before other individuals are consulted. The Appeals Officer, yourself and the Instructor shall be given access to these appraisals.  

5. The Appeals Officer will prepare a written decision on the appeal. The decision may be to retain, to raise, or to lower the grade. Substantial and convincing evidence must be shown to warrant a grade change. 

6. You will be notified by registered mail of the decision, and a copy will be sent to the instructor.  

7. The Appeals Officer is empowered to change the grade if the instructor is unwilling or unable to do so.