I'm on the verge of being kicked out of my course and I need some guidance

[Birdoftruth]

I am in the masters program at RGU in Scotland. I am in the 2nd year and have passed 3 out of the 2 modules from last year. The summer module was neuro and originally I did not pass my OSPE and my Coursework. I resat both the OSPE and the Coursework instead of going on placement between the length of January and March. I indeed passed my OSPE resit but not my coursework and have essentially been withdrawn from my course. I have 20 business days to make an appeal for extenuating circumstances on this or I'm back to the USA with $47,000 of debt and nothing to show for it. Quite a dire situation.

The problem is, and the reason for such poor performance on this coursework was Jan-Mar has been, emotionally speaking, a very difficult period of my life. Without going into too much personal details, the girl the girl I was with cheated on me and then later in march began stalking me and this had immense strain on me and there were days when nothing was getting done. While I did finally have a finish product by the due date, it was poor and not my best effort by a long shot. I look at the paper now and it is just pathetic. While there were other confounding factors for my stress such as my family announcing they couldn't come visit me because they had to pay $5000 for my dad's cataracts surgery (totally understandable) and the death of my uncle. But I've dealt with death in the family before and disappointment like that so to be totally honest I was able to process those emotions normally. But the impact of this relationship had a profound effect on me.

The problem is, besides droves and droves of text logs, I do not have any sort of documentation from a third party aside from my closest friends in that time period that demonstrates indeed I was affected. This is because I thought I had it handled and I was was always taught by my dad to always have a never let them see you sweat attitude in life. You could essentially chop off my leg and ask me how my day is and I'd tell you it's going fine. I do have dyslexia and dysgraphia and the learning center is going to write a letter in support of me and I am going to receive Counselling from the Health and Wellbeing center so they can assess me and potentially write a letter voicing the impact the past has had on me and if need be liaise with a GP.

Does anyone have any advice for me?

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[jblil]

You seem to have hit a rough patch, sorry to hear that. I hope the future will bring good changes.

IMO, you would need to do two things: first, get some kind of statement from a neutral party that your emotional state was not normal during those months. If I were part of a committee looking at your case, I wouldn't necessarily believe what you say or what your friends say. However, a letter from the school's Counseling Services will carry more weight. Second, draw up and present a plan that shows that you have taken concrete steps to address your failures and that they won't occur again. I know, it's easier said than done. But I imagine your school will want some kind of assurance that you won't mess up a second chance, were they to give you one.

 

[AlanWattsBlues]

Sounds like a bad set of circumstances to have to deal with and I hope this comes to a good resolution soon.

I don't know how relevant anything I have to say might be to your situation, but I saw 3 people fail during our second semester. One approached it with a great deal of humility and basically did whatever the professors advised. His life got delayed a year, but he's back on track now and making progress toward becoming a PT.

The other two left under less good circumstances. They were frustrated and felt that they didn't get fair treatment in class/practical grading. I happened to agree with them, and I can understand why they didn't want to come back to the same program. A year later, one decided to stop pursuing PT altogether. The other applied to another program, got an interview and felt good about it. The rest here is rumor, but this is the big warning: This student was ultimately declined at the new school. When he followed up with the interviewer for feedback, he learned that the new school called his old school for a reference and heard enough to decide that his application should be declined. Which sucks…because he's basically getting blackballed from the profession by the school he failed out of.

My takeaway from all of this is that:

1. You can fail out and return and get your life back on track
2. It's possible to burn bridges in a way that makes becoming a PT nearly impossible
3. The deciding factor seems to be the way that the faculty perceive you on a personal level. They want you to be earnest, humble, patient and absolutely dedicated to becoming a good PT. (They also want you to pay homage to their authority over you.) If your life might get pushed back a year, don't flinch. Accept it as a valuable opportunity to shore up some weaknesses in your knowledge-base. Frame everything in terms of your own personal responsibility ("I could have alerted professors earlier to these challenges, I could have sought help earlier,…" ). For all the paperwork and formal discussions, I believe these decisions are driven by personal emotion. Let it be on your side.

Good luck to you. Please keep us posted on how your appeal develops.