The Goal of Higher Education. If you face academic dismissal, remember why you went to college. No one goes to college or university simply to suffer academic dismissal. The goal of higher education is generally to earn a degree or certificate. Some college students do find better opportunities than finishing their degree. But even for those fewer students, their goal is to persevere long and far enough in their education to decide on their own the value of finishing their degree. No one of course wants their school to dismiss or expel them. Students prefer pursuing their own opportunities and making their own choices, rather than having the school tell them what they can and cannot do. That's largely the role of higher education, to equip students with the knowledge, skills, identity, and commitment to succeed both in life and in their chosen field. If you face dismissal, remember and recommit to your academic goal.
The Prospect of Academic Dismissal. Despite the strong commitment to succeed of most students who pursue higher education, a large number of those students nonetheless face academic dismissal. One academic initiative reports the overall national undergraduate attrition rate to be around forty percent. Another school’s study showed that forty percent of the high rate of overall attrition was, in fact, due to academic disqualification. Students don't just get kicked out of college for misbehavior. Many more students suffer dismissal on academic grounds. They simply haven't made the grades. Academic dismissals happen at every school, in every program, at every level. And they happen with surprising and disappointing frequency. If you anticipate or face academic dismissal, don't think that you are alone. Instead, strategize for how to overcome the challenge. Above all, get expert help. Retain national academic defense attorney Joseph D. Lento and the Lento Law Firm to discern and pursue your best option to complete your degree.
Causes for Dismissal. Many students assume that their academic preparation, good health, and strong social support insulate them from the risk of academic dismissal. But no matter who you are and where you are, your prospects for suffering academic dismissal are real, even if you have substantial academic skill, the greatest resources, and the highest commitment. All sorts of causes for dismissal can intervene, derailing even the most earnest and best equipped of students. The academic initiative cited above lists over-commitment to too many courses, unbalanced schedules, excessive pass/fail options, stress, anxiety, or depression, and unexpected personal events, among the many other causes for academic difficulty. Another university lists illness, injury, homelessness, a family member's death, financial reversals, military call ups, relationship issues, and addictions as other common causes of academic disqualification. An unexpected illness, injury, death in the family, birth of a child, divorce, job loss, or other circumstance can derail any student. No need to feel sorry for yourself. Schools recognize these and other challenges and often, with the right advocacy, offer relief.
Facing Academic Dismissal. The student who gets a notice of academic dismissal from their college or university, or who anticipates such a notice soon, faces an enormous emotional, social, financial, and personal challenge. At some point in life, we all have the experience of not making the team, not getting the sought-after job, or not getting into the desired neighborhood or club. We all face disappointments, many minor and some major. But having your college or university dismiss you for academic issues is an extraordinary challenge. Indeed, academic dismissal is so extraordinary that you should not attempt to face and overcome it alone. Your emotional condition and personal involvement may leave you without the judgment and discernment to pursue your best course to getting back on track with your university. You may also lack the academic administrative knowledge and experience, and advocacy skills. Instead, retain national academic defense attorney Joseph D. Lento of the Lento Law Firm to help you strategize effectively, all the way through.
What's at Stake in a Dismissal? One big reason why facing academic dismissal can be so upsetting is that students pursuing higher education have so much at stake. Think of the resources, not just tuition, room, and board, but also time, foregone earnings, and pure effort, that you have committed or will be committing to your education. Dismissal puts all of those personal and financial investments at risk. Academic dismissal also puts your future, including your education, job, career, and reputation, at stake. One college nonprofit organization reports that students earning a college degree “stand to make over $500,000 more in their lifetime than those who only attain a high school diploma” and that those earning an advanced degree can “make over $1,000,0000 more in their lifetime than those who completed high school.” And the academic initiative cited above reports that educational attainment correlates not just with income but also with marriage and homeownership. You had good reason to pursue a college or university degree. Don't give up simply because you face academic dismissal.
The Value of Persevering. You may have to persevere through your academic dismissal situation because of the challenge of finding another school to admit you. But beyond that great concern, you actually have an extra reason and reward for not simply submitting and succumbing to academic dismissal. If instead, you push through, your reward can be greater than if you hadn't faced dismissal at all. Persevering through and beyond the threat of academic dismissal has its own value. Everyone has heard that overcoming challenges builds character and coping skills. And indeed, one empirical study of over 12,000 undergraduate students at a representative, mid-sized, Midwestern university concluded that while academic suspension disorients a student, students who persevere back into and through their program build competence and confidence in transformational perspective. If you get the expert help you need to overcome dismissal, and you persevere on through, you can be stronger, smarter, more secure, more confident, and more stable than your classmates who didn't face the same academic dismissal challenge.
Challenging Dismissal. Students can successfully challenge academic dismissal, regaining good standing at their school. Don't give up at the first notice of dismissal concerns. Thousands of college and university students every year successfully recover from notice of academic dismissal. They do so in various ways, depending on the school, its policies, and the student's unique circumstances. Sometimes, the successful challenge involves correcting administrative errors that led to undue notice. Other times, the successful challenge involves completing a course or appealing and improving a course grade. Other times, the successful challenge involves qualifying for emergency relief or relief for extenuating circumstances. Schools also have readmission and restart policies that can, in special circumstances, provide attractive options to continue on with the degree to completion. Retain national academic defense attorney Joseph D. Lento and the Lento Law Firm to help you discern, explore, and pursue all options.
Dismissal Uncertainty. Challenges to dismissal can, with the right advocacy, often be successful because of the uncertainty of dismissals. Although academic standards can appear to be as simple as a single grade point number, calculating that number can actually be quite complex. Calculating that number can also require several judgments, some of them subjective or discretionary. A dismissal warning or notice may look to you to be clear, firm, and unequivocal. Yet schools make mistakes. School officials also sometimes make poor, unduly harsh, or uninformed judgments. Those school officials may be quite willing to have a student's attorney representative correct them or quite willing to reconsider their discretionary judgment on additional information. Don't wrongly assume that the numbers are the numbers, beyond challenge. National academic attorney Joseph D. Lento has helped hundreds of students navigate academic dismissal to regain good standing.
Dismissal Standards. A 2.00 / 4.00 grade point average is a typical minimum academic standard to maintain good academic standing, as a recent U.S. News article reports and a college counseling service confirms. But schools vary in their policies. Some require lower grade point averages for freshmen or for specific programs within the school. On the other hand, academic standards can be higher for some schools and programs, especially at the graduate level, where a 3.00 / 4.00 grade point average may be the minimum for good standing. But at most schools, falling below the minimum standard is alone not enough for academic dismissal. A student must often remain below the standard for a certain duration, say for a term or two, or longer, depending on the student's school, program, and the number of credits. The City College of New York is an example, where students who have a grade point average below the required 2.00 may continue as long as they earn at least a 2.50 each semester. At many schools, like the University of Michigan, extenuating or emergency circumstances may also relieve a student from the strict application of grade point minimums, giving the student a greater chance for regaining good academic standing. Standards are, in a sense, made for modification. Don't submit to academic dismissal without investigating options.
Why School Help Is Not Enough. Students facing academic dismissal often assume that academic advisors and other school officials will provide them with all the help that they need to pursue every option to continue in the program. But that assumption is often wrong. Advisors and other officials have multiple roles, some of them conflicting. When they interpret and apply school standards, those school officials have deans, provosts, presidents, alumni, employers, accreditors, regulators, and others to whom to answer. Your interest is not always their primary interest. Your interest is almost never their sole interest. School officials are not independent, and they are not your advocate. School officials also have multiple competing demands on their time. While school officials can often be helpful, they can also often be unhelpful, distracted by other duties, and disinterested in your concerns and cause. Don't leave your future in the hands of those who don't necessarily know you or value you. You have too much at stake not to get the professional help that you need to achieve your educational goal.
An Academic Attorney's Role. That's where your own retained academic attorney comes in. When you retain an expert academic attorney to represent you and advocate for you, you get the help of a skilled, knowledgeable, and experienced professional wholly devoted to you and only to you. When you retain national academic attorney Joseph D. Lento, you also get an advocate whose experience has taught him sensible options, reasonable approaches, and achievable objectives that school officials may not even know. Attorney Lento can often propose to school officials an academic plan, approach, and resolution that saves your educational career while improving the school's own retention rate and tuition bottom line. With firm and creative attorney advocacy, win-win resolutions are possible in otherwise dire-looking academic dismissal situations. Just any attorney won't do. You need an attorney with knowledge of and experience in the peculiar customs, procedures, norms, and protocols of academic administrative matters. That's attorney Lento.
Expert Attorney Help Available. Fortunately, Attorney Lento is available to college and university students nationwide. Attorney Lento has made it his law practice's focus to help college and university students avoid academic dismissal. That's what effective fighters do: they commit to helping others in valuable causes, and then they aggressively prepare, advocate, and pursue. If you face academic dismissal at your college or university, then don't get in over your head trying to handle it alone. Instead, get expert attorney help. Retain national academic defense attorney Joseph D. Lento and the Lento Law Firm to aggressively and effectively represent you. Attorney Lento has helped hundreds of students at colleges and universities nationwide to rescue their education and restore their prospects for a satisfying career. Call 888.535.3686 go online to tell us about your case.
