WELCOME STUDENTS!
If your Adviser or College/Campus Petition Submitter has instructed you to initiate your petition
using the SUPR Petition eForm, this User Guide will be helpful. If not, you won’t utilize this User Guide.

Initiating a Student Petition  VIEW GUIDE IN PDF FORMAT

1. BEFORE INITIATING THE PETITION PROCESS
   To initiate a petition, students should talk with their adviser or college/campus petition contact, read important information at the following URL, and gather all required petition documents prior to accessing the petition eForm. View information here:
   (https://studentpetitions.psu.edu/student-petition-landing-page/)
2. BEFORE BEGINNING THE EFORM
   1. Students first need to be connected to the Penn State VPN, GlobalProtect. If you are on campus and connected to the Penn State network, you will already be connected. If you’re not on campus, you may need to install the GlobalProtect VPN on your home computer.
      

      Students will be prompted to Authenticate with a Penn State Access Account ID and Password via Penn State Sign in and Multifactor Authentication (MFA).

      

   2. Students who do not have an active Penn State Access Account or who cannot access the GlobalProtect VPN will not initiate their petition, and will work with their adviser or college/campus petition contact to have their petition(s) submitted.
   3. ALTERNATIVE GRADING PETITIONS: If you want to prepare a petition for an exception to the Alternative Grading System, please talk with your Adviser or the Authorized Petition Submitter for your college or campus. You will not initiate this type of petition. They will prepare and submit the petition for you. The only terms that Alternative Grading was enabled were Spring 2020, Fall 2020, and Spring 2021. These are the only terms for which Alternative Grading petitions will be accepted.
3. ACCESSING THE FORM
   After gathering all required documents, use the SUPR eForm to complete the Student Petition Request and initiate the process. Note that the form must be completed in its entirety, as there is not an option to save and return.
   SUPR FORM TO INITIATE A PETITION (https://s8-dmscoed-p01.ad.psu.edu:9009/docfinity/app/forms/#mode=edit&formname=Student%20Petition%20Request%20FormStudentresponsive)
4. SPECIAL NOTES FOR COMPLETING THE EFORM
   1. If students have accessibility concerns or technical difficulties with completing the eForm, they should contact Student Petition Staff at the email address listed on the top of the form: suprstaff@pennstateoffice365.onmicrosoft.com.
   2. Students cannot submit petitions to the Faculty Senate Office directly using the form.
      When students complete and submit the form, their petition request will be sent to their adviser or the authorized petition submitter for the college or campus where they are enrolled currently or where they were last enrolled when at Penn State.
   3. Students need to submit separate petitions for each term or for each petition type in the same term (Example: retroactive withdrawals for Fall 2020 and Spring 2021 would be two separate petitions OR a retroactive late course drop and a retroactive administrative course cancellation, both for the same term, Fall 2020, would also need to be submitted as two separate petitions). After initiating the first petition, a confirmation message will display. Refresh the browser and the petition eForm will clear and another petition can be started.
   4. Students may use the same supporting documentation of extenuating circumstances if the reason for the petitions are the same. For 2 different terms, students are encouraged to provide documentation that pertains to each term specifically.
   5. All fields marked with an Asterisk * are required fields to complete.
   6. The TAB key MUST be used to navigate through the eForm; do not use the Enter Key.
   7. The eForm has two pages to complete before petition initiation occurs.
      1. The first page identifies the submitter of the petition (Student), has questions about student contact with an adviser or college/campus petition contact, and information concerning Education Abroad, and LionPATH.
      2. The second page requests information related to the type of petition being initiated and includes upload areas for documentation.

COMPLETE THE FIRST PAGE OF THE EFORM USING THE INFORMATION BELOW AS A GUIDE

1. ANSWER QUESTION ABOUT ADVISER/AUTHORIZED PETITION SUBMITTER CONTACT
   1. First, a question displays: Have you met with an adviser or your college or campus petition contact? Students must initiate their petitions through the academic where they are enrolled currently or the last academic unit where they were enrolled when at Penn State. If they have not talked with an adviser or an authorized petition submitter from an academic unit, they must do that first before using the eForm.
      
   2. If students answer No to this question, a message will display stating that they need to meet with an adviser or a college/campus petition contact.
      
      1. Two links are provided. One is for University Park petition contacts, and the other link is for petition contacts for campuses other than University Park (for instance, Penn State Altoona).
      2. At this point, students will not be able to continue any further with the petition
         initiation, and should close out of the form by clicking the X in the browser tab.
         Nothing will be sent. Students should come back to the form after they have talked
         with their adviser or college/campus petition contact and can answer Yes to the
         question.
   3. After students answer Yes to the question, they will get a Continue Button at the bottom of the page and can continue completing the eForm.

2. REMINDER ABOUT HAVING DOCUMENTS READY TO UPLOAD
   1. After students answer Yes to the question about meeting with an adviser or college/campus petition contact, the next item on the form is a **Note. This reminds them that they should have all the required documents ready to be uploaded into the system.
      1. A link  is provided to a page on the Faculty Senate website that lists documents that are required for each petition type. There are some registrar documents that students will not be able to upload to the system. For example, grade change forms for retroactive late add of courses, or administrative course cancellation forms for the cancellation of courses. In these cases, students will initiate their petition without those documents, and their adviser or college/campus petition contact will upload those forms for them when they receive the petition request. For the next entries, it’s very important to remember to use the TAB KEY and NOT the Enter Key to move through the form entries.
3. ENTER PENN STATE ID NUMBER
   1. Students will enter their Penn State ID Number in the text box under *PSU ID (this is the number that starts with 9)
      1. Press TAB and wait a second or two. The First Name and Last Name will display in the text boxes to the right. This information is populated from the Lion PATH system.
4. ANSWER EDUCATION ABROAD AND LIONPATH QUESTIONS
   1. Now there are two questions to answer.
      
      1. Question 1: *Are you petitioning for a term you studied abroad?
         If students are petitioning to late drop courses or withdraw retroactively from a term in which they studied abroad, they will answer Yes to this question. If not, they will answer No.
      2. Question 2: *Does this involve a LionPATH interaction or problem?
         If students mention in their student letter that they either had a problem with LionPATH functionality when they attempted to complete the action they are petitioning for, or if they thought they had completed the action in LionPATH, but it didn’t happen for some reason, they will answer Yes to this question. If LionPATH wasn’t a factor, they will answer No.
5. CLICK THE CONTINUE BUTTON AT THE BOTTOM OF THE FORM
   This will move you forward to the second page of the form.

COMPLETE THE SECOND PAGE OF THE EFORM USING THE INFORMATION BELOW AS A GUIDE

• AT THE TOP OF PAGE 2, STUDENT INFORMATION IS AUTOMATICALLY POPULATED FROM LIONPATH
  1. PSU ID
  2. Access ID
  3. Citizen Status
  4. Last Name
  5. First Name
  6. Middle Name
  7. Email Address
  8. Phone Number
  9. Campus
  10. Program
  11. Plan Major
• INTERNATIONAL STUDENTS
  If Citizen=International AND the student is initiating a petition for a retroactive withdrawal, the student will need to discuss implications for immigration and sponsorship with a Penn State Global staff member. After the student initiates the petition, SUPR will send an email to Penn State Global staff, and they will contact the student to set up a time to discuss. This is for retroactive withdrawal petitions only.
  
• SELECT PETITION TYPE
  1. A link is provided to a web page that describes each petition type.
     (https://studentpetitions.psu.edu/student-petition-types/)
     

     If a student chooses Retroactive Withdrawal from the dropdown menu, a question will display: While a student at Penn State, have you ever received federal student aid for any term? If students answer Yes, there will be a place further down on the form to upload the required Student Aid Review for Retroactive Withdrawal form.

     1. Before completing the petition eForm, students who are petitioning for a retroactive withdrawal and have received federal student aid at any time while at Penn State should already have talked with a Student Aid staff member about implications for aid should their petition be approved. The Student Aid Review for Retroactive Withdrawal form, including the student and Student Aid signatures should be ready to upload into the system.
        
     2. If a student answers No to the Student Aid question, no consultation with Student Aid is required and no form is required to be uploaded.
• ENTER THE TERM AND COURSE(S) BEING PETITIONED
  
  

  The term must be formatted with two CAPITAL letters indicating the term, followed by two numbers indicating the year (Examples: FA19 for the fall 2019 term; SP20 for the spring 2020 term; SU21 for the summer 2021 term).

  1. If the petition request is for a Retroactive Withdrawal or for other petition types where all courses in a term are affected, courses do not need to be entered. Students will only need to enter the term for a Retroactive Withdrawal petition type.
  2. If students are petitioning for a Retroactive Late Course Drop or for other petition types where courses are needed, students will enter courses.
  3. If students are petitioning for more than one course, they should enter the first course, then click on the checkbox to the right that says, “add another course” and another text box will display below for them to enter another course.
• UPLOAD PETITION DOCUMENTS
  Upload documents by clicking on the “Choose File(s)” button next to each specific document description. Be sure to upload all documents into the correct spaces designated on the form. See instructions below.
  

  Please note that accepted file formats are PDF, JPG, PNG, DOC, and DOCX.

  Before uploading documents, please be aware that you’ll need to:
  -Redact Personally Identifiable Information (PII) from all documents, and
  -Have documents translated that are in a language other than English.
  Visit the SUPR Landing Page, STEP 2: GATHER Page for information.

  Documents that will Need to be Uploaded are:

  1.  Current Transcript (This should be an unofficial transcript acquired from LionPATH. Do not upload an official transcript.)
  2. Student Request Letter (Be sure that the Student Letter Template has been used to create your letter)
  3. Supporting Documents
     1. Whatever is cited in the student letter as extenuating circumstances for an exception to academic policies needs to have written documentation uploaded (For example, a death certificate or obituary supporting the claim of a death in the family; medical documentation supporting the claim of illness or injury; mental health documentation supporting the claim of mental health struggles; court records supporting the claim of parent’s divorce; an adviser support letter, etc.).
     2. If several reasons are mentioned, documentation should be provided for each extenuating circumstance.
     3. Supporting
     4. documents may be combined and uploaded as one document, or several supporting documents may be uploaded using the “Choose File(s)” button.
  4. Registrar Documents (examples below)
     1. Withdrawal form if a retroactive withdrawal is being requested
     2. Registration Drop/Add form if a retroactive late drop or add is being requested
     3. Academic Renewal form if a retroactive or early academic renewal is being requested
  5. Student Aid Review for Retroactive Withdrawal form is required ONLY IF student is requesting a retroactive withdrawal and answered YES to the question above asking if federal student aid was ever received while at Penn State.
     1. If a student is petitioning for a retroactive withdrawal AND has received federal student aid at any time while at Penn State, the 2^nd Page of the form needs to be completed by Student Aid staff prior to uploading the form into SUPR. (Page with red circle below).
        
• ADVISER INFORMATION
  After the upload section of the petition eForm, there is adviser information that is automatically populated from LionPATH. If an adviser is identified, when a decision is reached on the petition, the adviser will be notified of the decision along with the student and the petition submitter.
  
• ACADEMIC INTEGRITY CONFIRMATION
  There is one more statement to confirm: “*I confirm that the content of my Faculty Senate petition is a truthful account of my situation.” This statement must be confirmed with YES to move forward with initiating the petition. Students need to be sure that they have provided information that is truthful and documentation that is legitimate.
  
• INITIATE PETITION
  Finally, scroll down until you see the “Send to Authorized Submitter” button at the bottom of the petition eForm. Click on the button to initiate your petition request.
  

1. AFTER INITIATING A PETITION
   A confirmation message will display and the following will occur:
   1. When a World Campus student initiates a petition, the petition is forwarded to the World Campus first for their input, and then on to the academic unit where the student is enrolled currently, or where they were last enrolled. The adviser and/or college/campus petition contact will get an email notifying them that the petition has been initiated.
   2. When all other students initiate a petition, the petition is forwarded to the academic unit where the student is enrolled currently, or where they were last enrolled. The adviser and/or college/campus petition contact will get an email notifying them that the petition has been initiated.
2. ADVISER AND/OR COLLEGE/CAMPUS PETITION CONTACT INPUT
   The student’s adviser or the authorized petition submitter for the academic unit where the student is enrolled will read the petition and view the documents provided by the student.The adviser or college/campus petition contact will:
   1. Review the petition for completeness.
   2. Check for required and relevant supporting documentation.
      1. If they decide the petition is not a valid request, the petition may be cancelled, and the student would receive an email verifying the cancellation.
      2. If they believe that a stronger petition case could be made by providing some additional documentation, they may reach out to the student and ask for it. They can then upload the documents when received from the student.
   3. Make a recommendation of support, non-support, or neutral to the Senate Committee on Education.
   4. Submit the petition to the Faculty Senate Office for review.
      1. Students will get a confirmation email when their petition has been submitted to the Faculty Senate Office.
3. DECISIONS
   Decisions are made by the Senate Subcommittee on Undergraduate Petition Review. Students, advisers, and petition submitters will receive an email when a decision is reached.
4. TIMELINE
   Normal timeline for the petition process is 1-3 weeks from the time the petition is received by the Faculty Senate Office.
5. CHECKING PETITION STATUS
   1. Students and petition submitters can check the status of a petition by using the Student Petition Status Form.  (https://s8-dmscoed-p01.ad.psu.edu:9009/docfinity/app/forms/#formname=StudentPetitionStudentStatusForm)
      
   2. Remember that you will need to be connected to the GlobalProtect VPN to use the form.
   3. Enter your Penn State ID Number.
   4. Press TAB
   5. Enter your Last Name only in the textbox to the right of *Last Name.
   6. Press TAB
   7. All petitions that have been submitted to the Senate for the student will display below with their status(es). Statuses will show as one of the following:
      1. With Adviser/Submitter
      2. In Process
      3. Cancelled
      4. Approved
      5. Not Approved