| nope, do not put that 1
your substitute explanation is nowhere near enough to explain why you couldn't study by yourself and do marginally well on the test
the only way you could explain the 1 IMO is that you weren't in class the whole school year because of a catastrophic illness or accident
other than that, don't bother explaining the grade, just omit it from the application. It looks less suspicious when you don't have the grade (they assume you didn't sign up for the test) than when you have a 1 (they will question not only that class but every single one of your class for grade inflation) |