Speaking from personal experience, I advise you to accept the consequences of the events that occurred and move on.

There are, and will be, many important situations in life that require you to be in a certain place at a certain time. Punctuality and accountability are, quite arguably, even more essential in the workplace than in academia, where missing an important task or event can cost you your job, or can put lives in danger. Yes, mistakes happen. But the most important lesson of one's formative years--one that I personally believe is increasingly lost upon each successive generation of students--is learning how to ensure that important tasks are not missed, and if unforeseen circumstances arise, that you can anticipate and make appropriate contingency plans.

So, rather than trying to plead for another chance, rather than trying to "see what can be done," the solution is to recognize that you have made an serious error that cannot be rectified. It is no one else's place--not your professor, nor his or her supervisor, nor the academic institution--to burden themselves with the responsibility of fixing your mistake. Please understand that if that sounds harsh or dismissive, it is not meant to be. Again, I speak from personal experience. The sooner you accept the fact that there are some things you don't get to "do over," the faster you will grow as a person, and the more well-adjusted and better prepared you will be when you complete your academic education.

So, in light of some of the comments that have been posted in response to the above answer, I find it necessary to make a number of clarifications, which I should stress are not necessarily directed at the individual who originally posted the question.

First, I am not suggesting that one should not ask if an exception or alternative arrangement could be made. But any request must be understood to be made with the expectation that the answer is--and will be--no, that the default position and policy has already been spelled out clearly and well in advance, and that once the decision has been made, you are to abide by it. This is not some kind of "negotiation" you are entering into. This is not something where, if you "just try harder" you might convince someone to take pity on you and you can get your way.

For someone to respond to the above by saying "but I could end up in serious financial debt and be 'forced' to drop out," again, I am not unsympathetic, but surely such a consequence could not have been lost upon you when you were informed of the policy in the first place. If something is that important, then a commensurate degree of preparation should have been made. Why should you be given special consideration when others did not have this issue?

If you were a critically ill patient in a hospital, scheduled to undergo a surgical procedure to be performed by a skilled specialist, but that surgeon oversleeps and is not available, and you die, is that a situation where the surgeon can just ask the hospital for a do-over? Conversely, what kind of patient would accept your excuse if you were that surgeon? That is the kind of real-life scenario that adults must prepare for. The notion that a student can even think that some kind of after-the-fact negotiation is even possible, is one that the professor has every right to regard as insulting and wholly inappropriate.

Speaking from personal experience, I advise you to accept the consequences of the events that occurred and move on.

There are, and will be, many important situations in life that require you to be in a certain place at a certain time. Punctuality and accountability are, quite arguably, even more essential in the workplace than in academia, where missing an important task or event can cost you your job or can put lives in danger. Yes, mistakes happen. But the most important lesson of one's formative years--one that I personally believe is increasingly lost upon each successive generation of students--is learning how to ensure that important tasks are not missed, and if unforeseen circumstances arise, that you can anticipate and make appropriate contingency plans.

So, rather than trying to plead for another chance, rather than trying to "see what can be done," the solution is to recognize that you have made a serious error that cannot be rectified. It is no one else's place—not your professor, nor his or her supervisor, nor the academic institution—to burden themselves with the responsibility of fixing your mistake. Please understand that if that sounds harsh or dismissive, it is not meant to be. Again, I speak from personal experience. The sooner you accept the fact that there are some things you don't get to "do over," the faster you will grow as a person, and the more well-adjusted and better prepared you will be when you complete your academic education.

So, in light of some of the comments that have been posted in response to the above answer, I find it necessary to make a number of clarifications, which I should stress are not necessarily directed at the individual who originally posted the question.

First, I am not suggesting that one should not ask if an exception or alternative arrangement could be made. But any request must be understood to be made with the expectation that the answer is–and will be–no, that the default position and policy has already been spelled out clearly and well in advance, and that once the decision has been made, you are to abide by it. This is not some kind of "negotiation" you are entering into. This is not something where, if you "just try harder" you might convince someone to take pity on you and you can get your way.

For someone to respond to the above by saying "but I could end up in serious financial debt and be 'forced' to drop out," again, I am not unsympathetic, but surely such a consequence could not have been lost upon you when you were informed of the policy in the first place. If something is that important, then a commensurate degree of preparation should have been made. Why should you be given special consideration when others did not have this issue?

If you were a critically ill patient in a hospital, scheduled to undergo a surgical procedure to be performed by a skilled specialist, but that surgeon oversleeps and is not available, and you die, is that a situation where the surgeon can just ask the hospital for a do-over? Conversely, what kind of patient would accept your excuse if you were that surgeon? That is the kind of real-life scenario that adults must prepare for. The notion that a student can even think that some kind of after-the-fact negotiation is even possible, is one that the professor has every right to regard as insulting and wholly inappropriate.

Speaking from personal experience, I advise you to accept the consequences of the events that occurred and move on.

There are, and will be, many important situations in life that require you to be in a certain place at a certain time. Punctuality and accountability are, quite arguably, even more essential in the workplace than in academia, where missing an important task or event can cost you your job, or can put lives in danger. Yes, mistakes happen. But the most important lesson of one's formative years--one that I personally believe is increasingly lost upon each successive generation of students--is learning how to ensure that important tasks are not missed, and if unforeseen circumstances arise, that you can anticipate and make appropriate contingency plans.

So, rather than trying to plead for another chance, rather than trying to "see what can be done," the solution is to recognize that you have made an serious error that cannot be rectified. It is no one else's place--not your professor, nor his or her supervisor, nor the academic institution--to burden themselves with the responsibility of fixing your mistake. Please understand that if that sounds harsh or dismissive, it is not meant to be. Again, I speak from personal experience. The sooner you accept the fact that there are some things you don't get to "do over," the faster you will grow as a person, and the more well-adjusted and better prepared you will be when you complete your academic education.

Speaking from personal experience, I advise you to accept the consequences of the events that occurred and move on.

There are, and will be, many important situations in life that require you to be in a certain place at a certain time. Punctuality and accountability are, quite arguably, even more essential in the workplace than in academia, where missing an important task or event can cost you your job, or can put lives in danger. Yes, mistakes happen. But the most important lesson of one's formative years--one that I personally believe is increasingly lost upon each successive generation of students--is learning how to ensure that important tasks are not missed, and if unforeseen circumstances arise, that you can anticipate and make appropriate contingency plans.

So, rather than trying to plead for another chance, rather than trying to "see what can be done," the solution is to recognize that you have made an serious error that cannot be rectified. It is no one else's place--not your professor, nor his or her supervisor, nor the academic institution--to burden themselves with the responsibility of fixing your mistake. Please understand that if that sounds harsh or dismissive, it is not meant to be. Again, I speak from personal experience. The sooner you accept the fact that there are some things you don't get to "do over," the faster you will grow as a person, and the more well-adjusted and better prepared you will be when you complete your academic education.

So, in light of some of the comments that have been posted in response to the above answer, I find it necessary to make a number of clarifications, which I should stress are not necessarily directed at the individual who originally posted the question.

First, I am not suggesting that one should not ask if an exception or alternative arrangement could be made. But any request must be understood to be made with the expectation that the answer is--and will be--no, that the default position and policy has already been spelled out clearly and well in advance, and that once the decision has been made, you are to abide by it. This is not some kind of "negotiation" you are entering into. This is not something where, if you "just try harder" you might convince someone to take pity on you and you can get your way.

For someone to respond to the above by saying "but I could end up in serious financial debt and be 'forced' to drop out," again, I am not unsympathetic, but surely such a consequence could not have been lost upon you when you were informed of the policy in the first place. If something is that important, then a commensurate degree of preparation should have been made. Why should you be given special consideration when others did not have this issue?

If you were a critically ill patient in a hospital, scheduled to undergo a surgical procedure to be performed by a skilled specialist, but that surgeon oversleeps and is not available, and you die, is that a situation where the surgeon can just ask the hospital for a do-over? Conversely, what kind of patient would accept your excuse if you were that surgeon? That is the kind of real-life scenario that adults must prepare for. The notion that a student can even think that some kind of after-the-fact negotiation is even possible, is one that the professor has every right to regard as insulting and wholly inappropriate.