‘Student at Risk of Failure’

I have previously mentioned that I struggle with my mental health and motivation...

Two days ago, I recieved an email from an engagement officer at my university asking me to attend an ’engagement meeting’ as the university are;

Committed to helping students succeed and get a great degree... they are ... concerned about my current engagement and would like to talk about the progress I am making in my studies and how they can support me to improve this.

However, as many can assume, someone being labelled as an ‘at risk of academic failure’ does not feel very supported especially if they struggle with their mental health.

I suppose I am writing this to make sure that students struggling with attendance and are already feeling like a ‘failure’ in terms of their studies, assignments or every day life, that you are aware that you are not a ‘failure’. You’re just perhaps a little behind, tired, stressed and uncertain especially in this current climate, but in no way are you a failure...

My course is currently listed as ‘blended learning’ which consists of one on campus session lasting a whole 90 minutes and one online webinar a week (and that’s £9,250 a year considered well spent by the uni and government), however, I was unaware that if I would prefer to do all my sessions online, I should have applied for ‘online only’ learning, hence, my attendance dropping and my being labelled as this ‘failure’ of a student, despite all my notes being up to date and extensive and my assignments submitted before the deadlines.

In light of Lockdown 2.0, my sisters want me to move home because the OG Lockdown really f***ed with me and Casa a La Alice is a solo household (unless you count the cat, which I do but apparently not everyone does). Upon explaining this in my ‘engagement meeting’ I have found that I will still have to travel into the city for university once a week, as I haven’t applied for ‘online only’ and I have to ‘provide in depth reasoning and proof as to why’, which would cost around £35 providing this lockdown only lasts a month, so THANK GOD for the discount on uni fees, right? ... OH wait.

As I’m sure many can relate to the idea of proving ‘reasons and proof’ to justify why they just can‘t do some things is really not something we want to have to do every.single.day as surely I’m not the only one so damn tired of justifying why I’m having a bad day, or my attendance is low, or why I haven’t put make up on (to name a few of my daily inquests). Can we not just normalise “its just one of them days”, especially as half the time I physically cannot put a pin in the exact reason for them days and I’m hardly going to say “have you got half an hour or longer to unpack my brain, non-certified therapist?”.

I get that I’m going off on a rant here, but please try to bare with me. I am fully aware that the majority of people who ask these questions are concerned but some are just fishing for a reason to tell you to take time off work or make themselves feel better (this is actually something that has happened, I’m not just being difficult) but its hard work trying to figure out and filter those genuine concerned and those that are fake.

So basically, I just wanted to let students know, that you are not a failure just because you are struggling or your college/university neglected to tell you that even if the online links are available, you still have to apply for that attendance to be logged, or maybe they’ve found fit not to inform you of other issues that are then blamed on you. Or maybe, just maybe, you're having a tough time and they aren’t supporting you. But you are NOT a ‘failure’, you’re just having ‘one of those days’ and no explanation is necessary, but maybe, hopefully, you’ll have a good day soon.

Lockdown won‘t last forever... (fingers crossed)

Love,

Alice... an ‘at risk of failure student’... not.