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Professor B. Holly
English 101
26 March 2019
There are those that let failures define them, and then there are those that use failures to
provide opportunities for growth and success. Students on academic probation can often find
themselves at a crossroads between these two reactions to failure. The negative connotations
wellbeing and can lead them to self-shaming, which often results in further lack of performance
and motivation. It is all the more important for these students to seek out help from a psychologist
or counseling service because these burdens are often too heavy to carry alone. Going it alone can
often lead to a repetition of the patterns that led them here in the first place. An advisor, on the
other hand, can help guide students towards a positive, growth-minded, metacognitive mindset.
This guidance towards increased self-awareness and personal development will not only steer a
struggling student toward academic success and a sense of renewed optimism, but can also serve
Often times, students on academic probation have a fixed mindset when it comes to
intelligence. They see intelligence as inherent, not as something that can be developed. Fixed-
minded individuals view struggling to understand a topic as a bad reflection on themselves. The
University of Arizona’s Academic Affairs has a web series that touches on the opposite outlook,
which is a growth mindset. A growth mindset would imply that a person views intelligence as
something that can be developed. Students with a growth mindset believe failure is a part of
learning; they view struggling as an opportunity to grow and attain more knowledge. Feedback is
not taken personally, rather they recognize it as constructive criticism. The biggest difference and
what separate the academic results of these two different mindsets, is that fixed minded individuals
are, “more likely to seek to demonstrate their ‘smartness’ and less likely to ask questions in order
to overcome setbacks in their learning.” (Growth Mindset A Strategy in the Learning to Learn
Series). Although easier said than done, students should view setbacks and failures as a chance to
grow and should encourage themselves to persevere through challenges. It seems that many
students rarely take this approach to failure. A fixed mindset will often debilitate a student’s ability
to succeed and many students fall into this category because they aren’t equipped with the proper
mental tools or are too afraid to ask for help when they need it most.
When I started my freshman year at Indiana University in the fall of 2017, I had an
school, where class sizes were small and your hand was held most of the way. This led me to
being overly confident about my knowledge and abilities and also caused me to underestimate
the amount of work I needed to put in to thrive academically. By the end of the first semester, I
was not in good academic standing and was thus placed on academic probation. When the
second semester rolled in, instead of seeing it as an opportunity to grow and pick myself back up,
I became sad and full of shame and slipped further into my struggles. It was a mentality that I
couldn’t shake. Not once did I seek out help from a psychologist or school counselor and as a
result, I continued to do poorly. I was never taken off of probation and was dismissed from the
University. Now, reflecting back after gaining some helpful perspective from a psychologist, I
am able to understand the mindset I once had and can apply all the lessons that I learned from
a psychologist. It is understandable that students might feel, due to pride, that they don’t need
assistance that they can figure it out on their own. Some might feel that such help is useless because
of bad past experiences with such professionals, but how can a student with a fixed-mindset on
academic probation expect to thrive without support? To have the courage and self-discipline to
treat your own short-fallings is no easy task on your own. Studies have shown that reaching out
for support and participating in programs helps raise a student’s GPA. I can say from personal
with a wonderfully new perspective that has helped me regain my confidence academically. As I
look back, I do not feel that I could have done this alone.
The University of California, San Diego has a unique program called Goals in Action,
which is designed to help students on academic probation who struggle with their mentality
towards school. In 2007, Molly Nonce wrote an article for Diverse Education discussing the
program. Nonce wrote, “The Goals in Action research project fuses the work of the university’s
academic support office with the efforts of the student health and wellness department to address
social, behavioral and psychological functioning, both inside and outside the classroom.” (The
Singley led the program along with his colleague Dr. Jeanne Manese. GIA students partake in a
Counseling Services. Prior to the workshops, students hear testimonials from provosts, deans,
assistant deans and/or academic advisors who share their stories of hard times, some even facing
academic probation when they were in college. (The Psychological Impact of Academic
Probation) Hearing these stories introduces hope for these students and allows them to relate to
their advisors. Dr. Daniel claimed that students were getting a full GPA point higher, and showed
improvements in their psycho-social ability. Rarely do schools have programs such as GIA and I
believe that it's very important for all colleges to integrate programs like this so that students feel
supported and hopeful in their academic endeavors. Many student's need something like this
where they can apply these newly learned mindsets to their everyday study habits and
engagements in class.
through introspection and the ability to seek support. If students on probation master these
mental abilities, they have the power to face not only academic challenges, but also all obstacles
in life, whether it be striving for a promotion at work or trying to master a sport. Today, thanks to
my past experiences at Indiana, I feel that I am better able to improve on my skills as an athlete,
as a student and as a person. I continue to grow a little every day and will use my past failures as
Works Cited