Academic Amnesty Policy

Academic Amnesty allows students an opportunity to remove previously-earned poor grades from counting in their Polk State College grade point average (GPA) for the purposes of graduating or to meet admission criteria to a limited admission program. Students who have changes in their career goals or have experienced extraordinary life situations that affected their academic performance may petition for Academic Amnesty under the following conditions:

1. The student has not attended college for at least one full year after the term requested for amnesty.
2. After a period of absence of at least one full year, the student has completed 12 college credit hours with at least a 2.00 term GPA for each and every term.
3. The student’s overall GPA is less than 2.0 after the 12 completed credit hours.
4. The student may apply for amnesty for terms that are older than 5 years from the date of petition.
5. The student may apply for up to three terms, which must be consecutive terms on the student’s Polk State College transcript.
6. Only grades that are considered not passing qualify for amnesty, which include grades of W, I, F, and D where D is not a passing grade.
7. Terms that are part of an earned degree do not qualify for amnesty.
8. Amnesty may be applied to a student record only one time.

The student must complete a petition with an advisor, and the Petition Committee will render a decision. Courses selected for Academic Amnesty are still applicable to the calculation of financial aid satisfactory academic standards. However, if a student is granted Academic Amnesty, this may be noted in the financial aid appeal process. See Definitions of Academic Status.