Wiriting an appeal letter (1 Viewer)

[acho]

So currently this is the end of my 1st yr of BA, I applied for a degree transfer to Bachelor of Computer Science, but got rejected by the faculty.
They said the decision was made based on my tertiary education. I was suggested by the admission officer to write an appeal letter which she will forward to the faculty.

I failed a subject in my 1st semester. It was ecop while the other 3 subjects (ENGL, ECMT, and another ECOP) I scored 60-65. Then I catched up this recent semester with 5 subjects to get 48 cp a year(I took ECOP, WORK, ENGL, ARIN and INFO)and haven't gotten any results yet they rejected me (I think all of them will at least pass).

Yeah I know a pass had unlikely chance of transfer but computer science is not something like law which has high reqs, right?

Before uni, my passion was for Commerce and Economics subject but not anymore. During my BA studies, I realised that my potential is on IT subjects as I really enjoyed my INFO. I love technological stuff. The learning feels much more rewarding than others that I took. I see no point further my BA if I know I will not enjoy it. If I knew this would happen, I would have applied for BCs at the first place since I got sufficient GPA to do so. It's even worsened that I would have to start all from the ground, 1st year again spending time and money for it.

So that's my situation,
I have never written an appeal letter nor seen it. Totally clueless what they expect, the format, what should I include and what shouldn't. I would imagine that ground is not strong enough for an appeal letter for a degree transfer? If anyone could help or have had the same experience, your help will be greatly appreciated. A format of the appeal letter itself will be great.

Thank you guys

 

[Andi0390]

Its caught not catched, sorry I get obsessive.

Hope you get in, but I guess that you may have to wait until your next results come out.

 

[Silver Persian]

I don't know much about writing an appeal letter. It might be a good idea to get in contact with the Student Representative Council, who help students in their engagements with the University.

WAF, if you're reading, would getting in contact with the SRC be helpful in this situation?

Maybe try sending an email to the SRC here: help@src.usyd.edu.au

 

[withoutaface]

Possibly, but I doubt it. SRC is more there to help with academic appeals, not to help kids get transfers when their GPA is too low.

 

[goony]

If you can't get in this semester, you won't lose much time in your degree anyway. IIRC, you can take any info subjects offered by the School of IT (consequently the school of EIE) as art electives. Just enroll in typical subjects in the computer science degree/major.


btw waf, i think you may have missed my question in the winter chatter thread due to excess spamming, but would you recommend info3404/3504 or comp2007? I have to do both before the end of next year, but can only fit in 1 next semester.

 

[withoutaface]

I think I gave a non-committal answer. They're both fairly ok, INFO3504 will have you pulling your hair out for a little while until you figure out Postgresql but after that it's not too difficult and the lecturer knows his shit. COMP2007 was kinda interesting, and I should have done the assignments for it (which in retrospect weren't that hard).

 

[goony]

Cheers dude, still undecided but i got 3-4 weeks to make a choice eh.

 

[Doomah]

your GPA is what 3.8? below 4 is NEVER good. and yes they dont consider your S1 2009 results as yet, because they have to offer places NOW, not in 3 weeks time.

appeals letter wont help.

its like me appealing to usyd because my UAI is too low to get into medicine. basically your GPA is too low for you to enter the course, there are not enough places and there other people may want to do the same thing as you who have a higher GPA. so what can you do about it?

if you passion is really in IT, then do as many IT subjects as you can this semester, kick ass in them, get your GPA to around 4.5 and then apply through UAC in september/october to do an IT course either at usyd, unsw, uts... etc a GPA of 4.5 should get you into anyone of those uni IT courses.

 

[acho]

Thank you for the replies guys..

I don't know much about writing an appeal letter. It might be a good idea to get in contact with the Student Representative Council, who help students in their engagements with the University.

WAF, if you're reading, would getting in contact with the SRC be helpful in this situation?

Maybe try sending an email to the SRC here: help@src.usyd.edu.au
@silver persian
I would give it a try even though the chance is slim. Thank you

If you can't get in this semester, you won't lose much time in your degree anyway. IIRC, you can take any info subjects offered by the School of IT (consequently the school of EIE) as art electives. Just enroll in typical subjects in the computer science degree/major.
@gooni
How is that so? is there an IT major for BA? But if I remember correctly, the available electives from other faculties are limited and there is a limit for the amount you can enrol in( 1 elective from other faculties max per semester?)

your GPA is what 3.8? below 4 is NEVER good. and yes they dont consider your S1 2009 results as yet, because they have to offer places NOW, not in 3 weeks time.

appeals letter wont help.

its like me appealing to usyd because my UAI is too low to get into medicine. basically your GPA is too low for you to enter the course, there are not enough places and there other people may want to do the same thing as you who have a higher GPA. so what can you do about it?

if you passion is really in IT, then do as many IT subjects as you can this semester, kick ass in them, get your GPA to around 4.5 and then apply through UAC in september/october to do an IT course either at usyd, unsw, uts... etc a GPA of 4.5 should get you into anyone of those uni IT
@Doomah
Yes I am aware my 1st sem performance was poor due to failed ecop. As I have mentioned before, it just turned out that I was not quick enough to realise that it was not my area of interest, so I scored really bad. I am totally messed up.

If they don't consider S1 09 results, why can't we transfer in mid year?
I would like to do as many IT subjs as I can, but the options are limited and there is a limit on how many subjecyts from other faculties you can enrol in. Please correct me if I am wrong. If I could, then what would differentiate BA from BCs?



The officer wanted me to write an appeal letter, so there might be chances. I must give it a shot. I would greatly appreciate any assisstance to write the letter. Who should I address in the letter?
should I use this format?

Address(to who?)

Issues ( should I include this story)?

Ground( passion for IT and poor performance due to changing interest?)

Outcome


If this letter won't work out for me, what options do I have left?
-stay on BA and major in what?
-do IT at UTS or UNSW?( I am international student, so I guess that will affect my visa, wont it?)
-else?

Your inputs are greatly appreciated people, thank you

 

[goony]

Information Systems is a 'Table B' major. This includes all INFO and ISYS subjects up to 3rd year that the SoIT offers. Mind you, i think (not 100% sure) you'll be missing out on all the COMP subjects (most of which are computer major subjects).

Units of Study - Course Info for Current Students - The University of Sydney

You'll still have to do an arts related Table A major too. I reckon if you have no interest in doing arts subjects and want to do information systems, OR if you want to get into more computer science based students, you should apply to transfer at the end of this year to BSc. If not BSc, BCST run by the SoIT is alot easier to get into apparently, but the BSc gives you more flexibility (in case you want to do subjects outside IT). Usually to transfer to an equivalent degree, you'll need a credit average.

Also, if you're transferring into BSc, you'll have to do 12cp of junior maths and 6cp of intermediate maths, so keep that in mind (most people i know doing IT leave this until the end of their degree though)

 

[Doomah]

remember the people telling you to write an appels letter are just admin staff, they have no power or knowledge in how successfull these applications are. my guess is that it was a flippant remark because they get hundreds of complaints a day regarding results, adminininstration, special consideration and and whatnot and their standard answer is "well if your not happy you can always write an appeal letter" that usually gets the student of thier case......

but if you are intent on writing an appels letter, then you prob should wait untill you have received all your s1 results. that way you have at least something to stand on. because as of now, based upon your 2008 results, there are no places for you.

 

[jaimebien]

Not sure if this will help, but how about including details of any industry work/portfolio you may have?

 

[acho]

Information Systems is a 'Table B' major. This includes all INFO and ISYS subjects up to 3rd year that the SoIT offers. Mind you, i think (not 100% sure) you'll be missing out on all the COMP subjects (most of which are computer major subjects).

Units of Study - Course Info for Current Students - The University of Sydney

You'll still have to do an arts related Table A major too. I reckon if you have no interest in doing arts subjects and want to do information systems, OR if you want to get into more computer science based students, you should apply to transfer at the end of this year to BSc. If not BSc, BCST run by the SoIT is alot easier to get into apparently, but the BSc gives you more flexibility (in case you want to do subjects outside IT). Usually to transfer to an equivalent degree, you'll need a credit average.

Also, if you're transferring into BSc, you'll have to do 12cp of junior maths and 6cp of intermediate maths, so keep that in mind (most people i know doing IT leave this until the end of their degree though)

I presume Bsc is Bachelor of Science and BCST is Bachelor of Comp Science?
I am fine with maths so I guess that won't be a problem. If by more flexibility you mean I can choose chemistry, biology, physics, etc subject at Bsc, I am not interested in those fields. I wanna do just IT subjects.

So I have to do some arts subjects this semester along with some INFO or ISYS subjects in order to appy for a transfer at the end of this year?
Now this is my 2nd yr already, so the subjects I must choose are all senior subjects because of the junior cp limits which is 48, right?
In the student admin panel > enrolment variation > majors, I choose IT, Comp Sc and Maths. After saving my options, what will happen next? Because I could not see any INFO, ISYS and MATH on my UOS list. Does choosing those 3 majors mean I can enrol in units within them? If so, then great, because other arts majors does not make sense to me.

If this did not work out for me, do you think moving to UTS for BIT is a wise decision or other plausible options that you can think of? Is it possible for me with the current situation? Can I apply with my USFP transcript?

Thank you very much for the help, goony.

remember the people telling you to write an appels letter are just admin staff, they have no power or knowledge in how successfull these applications are. my guess is that it was a flippant remark because they get hundreds of complaints a day regarding results, adminininstration, special consideration and and whatnot and their standard answer is "well if your not happy you can always write an appeal letter" that usually gets the student of thier case......

but if you are intent on writing an appels letter, then you prob should wait untill you have received all your s1 results. that way you have at least something to stand on. because as of now, based upon your 2008 results, there are no places for you.

Yeah, I guess you're right, doomah. My results haven't come out yet not even one until now so I have to wait a lil bit longer. Could you think of any other solutions to my situation? Doing IT in UTS, is it possible with my current situation?

Thank you very much for the help, doomah.

Not sure if this will help, but how about including details of any industry work/portfolio you may have?

Sorry I have never been to world of work, hence no experience of understanding these terms. I presume portfolio is an achievement that you can show or something like that? sorry if I am newbie.

Thank you very much for the input, jaimebien.

 

[goony]

I presume Bsc is Bachelor of Science and BCST is Bachelor of Comp Science?
I am fine with maths so I guess that won't be a problem. If by more flexibility you mean I can choose chemistry, biology, physics, etc subject at Bsc, I am not interested in those fields. I wanna do just IT subjects.

So I have to do some arts subjects this semester along with some INFO or ISYS subjects in order to appy for a transfer at the end of this year?
Now this is my 2nd yr already, so the subjects I must choose are all senior subjects because of the junior cp limits which is 48, right?
In the student admin panel > enrolment variation > majors, I choose IT, Comp Sc and Maths. After saving my options, what will happen next? Because I could not see any INFO, ISYS and MATH on my UOS list. Does choosing those 3 majors mean I can enrol in units within them? If so, then great, because other arts majors does not make sense to me.

If this did not work out for me, do you think moving to UTS for BIT is a wise decision or other plausible options that you can think of? Is it possible for me with the current situation? Can I apply with my USFP transcript?

Thank you very much for the help, goony.

If IT is the only thing you want to do, then transfer into a BCST degree. IIRC they're alot easier to get into than the Bsc (the UAI was like mid to high 70's last year), and i think you only need a pass average to get into them from another faculty.

Wait, you're in your 2nd year already? What sort of subjects did you do last year? If you transfer over to a BCST you can count some subjects over from your old degree, but you can also choose not to count some (i.e. subjects that you feel will damage your WAM and are irrelevent to your new pursuits). Essentially you'd be starting again from 1st year of BCST, with possibly 1 or 2 subjects from your arts degree being transferred as free electives.

Of course you could transfer all your arts units over, but like you said, you can only count some of them towards the BCST.

Another option is to transfer into a combined degree, or plan for it down the track. But that would mean doing another major besides IT, and you probably will need at least a credit average to transfer.

As for actually enrolling in subjects, you'll probably need to enter the units of study manually (look up each code and enter it yourself). Check this out:

Advice on unit of Study Choice in 2009 for First Year Students: BCST, BCST(Adv) or BIT Degrees - Current UG - The University of Sydney

Look under mid-year entry students, that's probably the subjects you'd want to be doing. i.e.

INFO1103
MATH1xxx
MATH1xxx (i recommend MATH1004 and MATH1005, discrete maths and stats respectively)
INFO1003
ELEC1601 (if you can, if you can't enroll in it then just do a random free elective, maybe something like PHIL1012)

 

[acho]

If IT is the only thing you want to do, then transfer into a BCST degree. IIRC they're alot easier to get into than the Bsc (the UAI was like mid to high 70's last year), and i think you only need a pass average to get into them from another faculty.

Wait, you're in your 2nd year already? What sort of subjects did you do last year? If you transfer over to a BCST you can count some subjects over from your old degree, but you can also choose not to count some (i.e. subjects that you feel will damage your WAM and are irrelevent to your new pursuits). Essentially you'd be starting again from 1st year of BCST, with possibly 1 or 2 subjects from your arts degree being transferred as free electives.

Of course you could transfer all your arts units over, but like you said, you can only count some of them towards the BCST.

Another option is to transfer into a combined degree, or plan for it down the track. But that would mean doing another major besides IT, and you probably will need at least a credit average to transfer.

As for actually enrolling in subjects, you'll probably need to enter the units of study manually (look up each code and enter it yourself). Check this out:

Advice on unit of Study Choice in 2009 for First Year Students: BCST, BCST(Adv) or BIT Degrees - Current UG - The University of Sydney

Look under mid-year entry students, that's probably the subjects you'd want to be doing. i.e.

INFO1103
MATH1xxx
MATH1xxx (i recommend MATH1004 and MATH1005, discrete maths and stats respectively)
INFO1003
ELEC1601 (if you can, if you can't enroll in it then just do a random free elective, maybe something like PHIL1012)

Yes this august will be my 3rd semester. Last year I did
sem1
ECOP1002(F)
ECOP1003(P)
ECMT1010(P)
ENGL1000(P)
sem2 (due to failed ecop1002, I took 5subj worth 30cp to get 48cp 1st yr)
INFO1003(P)
ARIN2620(?)
WRIT1001(?)
WORK1003(?)
ECOP1001(?)

sorry that I forgot to mention that my initial pursuit for B Commerce. That's why I took all subjects that might help me later. But it turnt out that my interest had changed to IT since I took INFO1003.

I failed ECOP1002 because it was my 1st sem at uni( you know the transition was really overwhelming) It was my 1st time studying political economy so it is fairly new field for me. Furthermore, ECOP1002 is not the basic for political economy if I am correct. So what I have learnt in ECOP 1002 began to make sense during ECOP1001.

The workload of 5 UOS last sem potentially hurt my academic performance as well. I could score higher in INFO1003 if I was not given such circumstances. What's even worse, my project team members were not contributive at all, so only me and another member did the whole project (The project was expected to be done by 4 or 5 members so you could imagine how disadvantaged I was). Furthermore, 2 out of 5 didn't have final exams, so you could imagine how crazy I became the weeks after the mid term break especially at the end (one of the major assg's due date was on the 1st day of my final exam)

I have tried to enrol into the core subjs of BCst, I could not enrol to any UOS except MATH subjects. INFO1103/5, ELEC1601 are not for my course. Should I take MATH 1003 as well( I enrolled and it is pending)? how many MATH subjects you have to do? 3 maths for this semester?

the only INFOs I can take are
INFO1003 Foundations of Information Technology

INFO2110 Systems Analysis and Modelling

INFO3404 Database Systems 2

INFO3504 Database Systems 2 (Adv)









Are they cores for BCst? I can't take any ISYS subjects either.
I would rather reset all of my really poor academic performance starting from the 1st yr again because like you said it will hurt my WAM.

Thank you very much for assisting me up to this point, goony.

 

[goony]

Well you have to take 4 junior maths subjects (they're worth 3cp each, and you need 12), but i wouldn't recommend taking more than 2 per semester.

MATH1003 is much more calculus based (maths ext 1 would help heaps here). MATH1005 is stats, i found it alot easier than other first year subjects. I haven't done MATH1004, but i heard discrete maths isn't too bad either.

Try and get special permission to get into info1103...and take INFO2110, it's not programming, but it's easy enough (system modelling, intro to the design process). You don't HAVE to do ELEC1601, but it'll help if you can get special permission for that as well. If not, just take another free elective (a few bcst guys i know did ARIN and computer design subjects (deco, or desc or something?))

 

[acho]

I tried to enrol in these 4 subjs
MATH1004
MATH1005
INFO2110
INFO1103(if granted)?
I am kind of scared to enrol in 5 subjs now considering the workload I had last semester. But it said that I must enrol in 24 credit points in each semester unless I have special permission from the faculty.
so is it possible for me to take 4 subjects worth 18 CP for my third semester? If not, what else should I take? I would prefer not wasting any money for other subjects that I will find useless. what are the chances of me getting special permissions for INFO1103 and ELEC1601?

Who is the best person to ask for special permission of this unit? I reckon the faculty office would not grant me easily. The last time I asked for it they simply said if the UOS list doesn't have what you want then you can't.

And any idea when is the deadline of the enrollment?

Edit: I got this error
MATH 1005 Failed prerequisite checking because I already took ECMT 1010. so should I take MATH1003?

 

[goony]

ECMT1010, is that a stats course or something? You might be able to count it as a MATH subject if that's the case, but yeah take MATH1003 if you want. It's a bit harder (well i found it a bit harder) mind you. All about integral calculus, most comp sci students don't end up taking it.

I'm not sure who you should go to for special permission. I think you have to get the form from the arts office and then get it signed by the school of IT and then return it to the arts office. Once again, i'm not 100% on this, you should ask your degree director and stuff. You also might as well ask the SoIT if ECMT 1010 can be counted as a MATH subject.

Found another link for you: http://www.it.usyd.edu.au/current_students/undergrad/table_BCST.pdf

INFO2315 might be a good subject. It's a core subject for the Informatin Systems stream of the BCST degree, but only a recommended subject for the Computer Science stream. Also only has 'computer literacy' as a pre-req.

 

[acho]

Hi goony, I got all of my results, I got
ARIN2620 64
ECOP1001 65
WRIT1001 74
INFO1003 52
WORK1003 61

Do I still stand a chance to transfer? Of course, I will still lodge the special permissions form for INFO1103 and ELEC1601, but should I give it a try to write an appeal letter( back to the topic)? I know the INFO1003 is really bad and you have heard my whole story, about the F'ed up group project and overloading. Can I use that ground( I mean the whole story)?

 

[Ben Netanyahu]

do you know how to calculate your "new uai" (i forget the exact term). add your uai and gpa together, divide by two and that's your new uai. subtract anywhere from 5-10 marks from the current actual uai and this is the "effective uai". that was my experience from transferring...twice.

to write a succesful appeal you need to show either bias or failure of the university to follow their own guidelines. i very much doubt a folio of work as suggested would be grounds for an appeal. in fact, i'm not even sure how you'd go about this appeal since, imo (i'm probably wrong) this isn't an academic decision - it's an admissions decision. the process of appeal would be entirely different.