Hunting Hills has made the decision to remove final exam exemptions starting September 2016. The aim of this petition is to present to the school administration that many of the school community disagree with their decision to get rid of exemption.

There are several reasons why exam exemptions have benefited students and can continue to do so.

If a student has four exams to write during exam week then exam exemptions can really help in reducing stress. With one less exam to study for there is more time for other tests, bringing down anxiety levels.

When a student has their diplomas to study for, important tests which colleges and universities will be looking at, exempting a lower level course allows for more time to study for higher level courses.

There are already many restrictions on exempting that prevent people from taking advantage. You cannot exempt more than one test per subject, ensuring that students have a test in each subject for diploma practice. They also removed exempting the written portion of the English and Social Studies exam. This makes sure that every year students are getting practice in essay writing. Diploma practice has also become less important now that the diplomas are only worth 30% of a student's grade rather than 50%.

In order to exempt an exam, a student must have either above 80% or 65% with no more than two absences. This motivates students to get higher grades and attend classes, as it means that they can be awarded with one less test during exam week.

Some students, who obtain a high in-class mark, may find that it's almost impossible to keep their existing grade, This makes exam week very stressful, especially when these students are typically the ones who have a heavy course load.

Some option classes have finals during or shortly before exam week. Not being able to exempt options with finals can discourage students from taking that course as they have to consider whether they can manage that final, along with their mandatory courses.