Student sues her Univ. for failing a course (twice).

DALLAS, Pa. (AP) -- A nursing student who says anxiety and depression made it difficult for her to concentrate has sued a northeastern Pennsylvania university after twice failing a required course.

Jennifer Burbella claims her Misericordia University professor didn't do enough to help her pass a class on adult health patterns. Burbella says the lack of help caused her to break down crying.

For the final exam, the university gave Burbella some accommodations — she was allowed more time to complete the test and could take it in a “distraction-free environment,” according to the suit. Tomkins also offered to allow her to ask questions during the test, the complaint says.

When Burbella asked to take the exam in the same building Tomkins was administering the exam to the other students, she was denied — although another disabled student was given a separate room in the same building, the lawsuit alleges.

After failing the first time, Burbella says the university forced her to re-take the class in a summer session beginning four days later, causing "great trepidation."

The Citizens' Voice reports (http://bit.ly/1QFHxSC) the Stroudsburg woman is seeking more than $75,000 in damages.

Source.

Will she win!?

maybe the professor could have had more mercy on her (get it?), but if she's having this issues with a class, will she also have them on the job? It seems to me that being a nurse would mean you wouldn't work in a "distraction free environment".

A nursing student ..... a person who is going to have people´s health and even lives under her care wanting some special treatment from her teachers to pass her exams, you gotta be fucking kidding me. If she can`t handle the "stress" of a goddam exam how can she handle the real stress of practicing the profession on a daily basis.

The teachers should be congratulated for flunking her.

I completly agree with this.

this is another example of the entitlement society we live in now.. they think they deserve a trophy for participating. being a lazy idiot isnt a disability

Dang, people suing for everything these days. I guess i should sue McDonalds for giving out toys with unhealthy meals. Thats the only reasons kids want to go. Lol ..

Working in the health department and having anxiety seems like a bad mix...

Bingo.

The school is right down the road from me and quite a few people here think this girl is a moron for blaming others for her shortcomings.

If passing a test is something she is unable to do, how will she react when a doctor is stern with her or family of patients start yelling? Will she start to cry and sue everyone?

Pretty much this, when people's lives are in her hands she isn't going to be able to ask them for special accommodations...

She's going into medicine; people's lives directly depend on how good you are at your job.

If you're failing a class, then you're not qualified for the field period.

More importantly, medicine is a very very high stress environment. You will see people suffer and die. If she's falling apart during what sounds like an easy exam, then she wouldn't be able to handle the field.

Can't she sue the patient!?

Eh you can bring a lawsuit....doesn't mean you'll win.

Someone who's going through depression and anxiety shouldn't be a nurse

Lol. Sometimes I really think there should be a license requirement to sue anyone.

It is just another instance of people not taking responsibility for their own actions. Whether it was because she wasn't prepared for the test or whether she wasn't treating her anxiety and depression correctly. Was she seeing a professional for it? Was she medicated? Blaming the instructor for it is out there and it is a shame that time gets wasted in our judicial system on such nonsense.

Two words, anxiety and depression. She will win this court case because she was denied the provisions that she was entitled to/and or promised.

------------------------

she was allowed more time to complete the test and could take it in a “distraction-free environment,” according to the suit. Tomkins also offered to allow her to ask questions during the test, the complaint says.

When Burbella asked to take the exam in the same building Tomkins was administering the exam to the other students, she was denied — although another disabled student was given a separate room in the same building, the lawsuit alleges.

After failing the first time, Burbella says the university forced her to re-take the class in a summer session beginning four days later, causing "great trepidation."

Not qualified to be a nurse.

What an idiot. lol

I failed a couple of classes too. Guess what? I took a break, worked, realized work sucked, went back to college, got As and Bs, and changed career choices that was something that I wanted and was also realistic.

I should have sued. Could have gotten millions. lol

Hope she loses

I hope she dies

Not everybody can pass everything. Welcome to adulthood sweetheart. Get used to it.

What next? She'll start suing hospitals that refuse to hire her? She is the kind of person that is a parasite on humanity.

1) Fail class because of "anxiety."

2) School is obviously at fault.

3) Sue the school!!!1!!!

I say give the bitch a pass so she can go work in the field. She will be ran out on the first day.

Nursing is one of the most stressful jobs around as far as I am concerned. If she can't handle nursing school she can NOT handle working as a nurse. How is she going to handle residents and their families when they flip out about meds and generally get ridiculous with their expectations? How about when a resident codes?

Seriously, as a nursing assistant one thing I have learned is that people who can't deal with stress have NO BUSINESS being in the nursing field. They make some of the worse nurses I have ever seen...

It is good to see what people really think about those with disabilities in Off-Topic.

I am glad contemporary law in Western civilization prevents this kind discrimination and health care professionals do not think like this.

It might not occur to people, but stress management can improve or worsen rather than only the latter or it remain in a wretched state.

/leaves thread

@BranKetra: There are some harsh and unwarranted words in this thread, but reading the source of the source, it's easy to get the impression that she simply did'nt have what it took. The profession does demand a lot of mental fortitude afterall. Her issue seems to revolve around Tomkins not answering the phone during the test, which admittedly is a shitty thing to do when promised, but I'm not sure that's enough to constitute neglect.

I have personal experience with stress and anxiety in educational matters and it's real bloody easy (and comforting) to abstain from personal responsibility and you're very prone to projection.

Am I?

Are you what? Projecting? No, I don't think so.

As I already said, I agree that people are being shits in this thread, I'm just not sure this is something people should be sued over.

Edit.... Oh..... One is very prone, when under stress and anxious. English is a secondary language to me, so I'm tripping over my words.

I read the source's source again and my harsh words maintain.

You crazy americans sueing people for your own foolishness! (No offense to the sane american people)

@BranKetra said:

It is good to see what people really think about those with disabilities in Off-Topic.

I am glad contemporary law in Western civilization prevents this kind discrimination and health care professionals do not think like this.

It might not occur to people, but stress management can improve or worsen rather than only the latter or it remain in a wretched state.

/leaves thread

The problem is do you really want to make special accomodations for someone in a field where other people's lives are at stake? None of us want to fail but sometimes it's necessary to figure out where we stand. We have to evaluate the situation and decide if we want to overcome or cut our losses, not litigate to success.

@BranKetra said:

It is good to see what people really think about those with disabilities in Off-Topic.

I am glad contemporary law in Western civilization prevents this kind discrimination and health care professionals do not think like this.

It might not occur to people, but stress management can improve or worsen rather than only the latter or it remain in a wretched state.

/leaves thread

Then she could've asked a leave of absence while she dealt with her personal problems. It sounds like she never even considered it a possibility. Being denied that is something I could've understood a lawsuit about, not because she didn't get extra help that she shouldn't even have had access to in the first place.

Besides, what the article reports is incomplete, seeing how the reason why the professor failed to provide the extra help he promised wasn't reported. I find it EXTREMELY hard to believe that the professor would simply leave the phone ringing in the middle of a classroom where an exam was being taken.

Still, if she "broke" from stress in a stress-free environment with more time given I concur with what the guys before me said. She doesn't belong in an environment where mood swings and failure to answer to prompts in time can cause irreversible damage to someone else.

@MlauTheDaft: Okay. Thank you for clarifying what you meant.

@BranKetra said:

It is good to see what people really think about those with disabilities in Off-Topic.

I am glad contemporary law in Western civilization prevents this kind discrimination and health care professionals do not think like this.

It might not occur to people, but stress management can improve or worsen rather than only the latter or it remain in a wretched state.

/leaves thread

People on this forum have poisonous attitudes about this kind of stuff (just take a look at the classical mythology trigger thread where one poster called a sexual assault survivor a mental weakling for being severely uncomfortable about graphic depictions of rape). However, I think some of it is just immaturity and many of them will grow out of it.

That being said, I don't think this lawsuit is going to hold up. Lawsuits are not always the solution.

@GreySeal9: If you've been raped and can't handle a course that happens to mention rape in one of it's lessons in some context within it's course. It seems rather clear that You need to quite the course or work past your mental health issues. Do one or the other but no one should have to deal with this but you and what ever medical field/ personal improvement services you decide to use to help you get past YOUR ISSUE. No one else s.

Ps Your, you, You've doesn't mean you GreySeal

Actually, rape is not just "mentioned" in the lesson in question, but anyway I see no reason why rape survivors should have to quit courses. They can simply be warned about sensitive material and leave the class for a short period or some other arrangement. Secondly, saying that it's no one else's issue is not consistent with the real world. Professors have a responsibility to maintain a safe classroom environment. They have all kinds of training for exactly this reason. When I taught for awhile, I had to undergo said training.

Lastly, regardless of your opinion about this issue, you would agree that calling a rape victim a mental weakling is pretty bad, right?

I'm having some trouble with the college I'm going to, but I don't think I'd ever sue them over my difficulties.

Going to college isn't easy. You have to be really interested in what you're going to school for, have lots of time for school, and you should really scope out the different colleges that offer the course you're looking for before jumping into it.

And once you go, you won't learn every last thing you want to know about your field in class. They expect you to learn most of the crap on your own. They really just give you the basics.

Way to twist words into a strawman.

She wasn't called a "mental weakling" because she's a rape victim.

She was called a mental weakling because she flipped over A FUCKING WRITTEN TEXT to the point of saying it was a matter of self-preservation, decided to approach the professor who shrugged her off, and then decided to turn to an advocacy group over her accident instead of just walking out of the fucking class and study that thing on her own.

Wells's quote "adapt or perish" should be reworked into "adapt, perish or bitch about it".

It really is crazy. Yeah, classes should be safe, I don't think anyone disagrees with that. Fact is, that class WAS safe. Any fear for her safety is completely irrational and is only due to her own emotions.

No, she was called a mental weakling because her PSTD as a result of rape. But go ahead and apologize for mean-spiritedness.