Does anyone else feel a little less confident in their abilities to succeed after they join college? Everything seems a little more out of control and uncertain, and it became a little more difficult to determine one’s progress or standing in their class?
Because I certainly do. And from what I have heard and gathered, a lot of first years feel the same too once they join college.
I recently understood the probable reasoning behind this growing anxiety. It’s *hold your breath* marks.
The standard and stagnant schooling system has embedded the marking system so deeply into us, that it becomes difficult to realise one’s worth when suddenly marks stop mattering, or at least when they lose their weightage as the measuring scale for one’s success. But at the same time, we have been judged and scaled based on our marks for more than a decade, and for the better part of our school lives. It’s almost impossible to detach our perception of success from that numbered measuring tape called marks.
In college, where suddenly research and critical thinking and work experience are given emphasis, we find ourselves faltering in our steps, and feel like things are getting out of our control. Because in college, the marking and study structure is a lot more different than it used to be in school. But our perception is still the same, considering the fact that we were grilled with a strict time-table bound schooling system for over a decade. A system where our worth was determined by our marks.
So when we are unable to score as good as we used to, we unconsciously start feeling like we are inadequate. And, it further hampers our confidence and enthusiasm to learn. This lowers our self-esteem, and our anxiety levels rise; it affects our ability to observe, analyse, understand, and think critically. The moment we think about scoring in our exams, our focus shifts from learning the subject to scoring marks.
Due to this, we are more concerned about ways to score more in less time and effort. And this completely takes away the essence of learning all together. Because our goal is not learning and understanding, but scoring.
Do you ever feel like you are more interested in learning everything outside of your academic syllabus? I bet you do.
Because when we read or watch something without marks and exams weighing on our heads, our entire focus is on enjoying the content, and not gathering enough information to vomit it back on a sheet of paper in three hours.
When we try to learn something on our own, we set the pace and we enjoy it. We obsess over it, google it, and try to learn as much as we can. But the moment that same thing is in our syllabus, or when we are told that we would be tested on it, we lose interest. The shift of focus from learning to marks is probably the reason for it.
Now, college demands we be engaged, interested, and creative when it comes to learning, but still holds the gun (with marks written on it) to our heads. Balancing these two is close to impossible for a student. The school system is time bound, syllabus bound, and completely restricted. We are forced to learn a prescribed book in a prescribed way in a prescribed time limit. Anything outside this is seen as unimportant or irrelevant.
The moment a child tries to shift from this well defined path, he is punished into following it again, or is made to feel inadequate, if they are unable to cope up with the set pace. And the determinant is marks.
Our schooling system is like being in a car race where the lanes and cars, the finish line, the tracks, even the tyre inflation and types are defined. And we have been in this race for years. In college we are suddenly told to learn, and question, to set our own innovative path and work accordingly, we are expected to think for ourselves and on our own feet.
So, basically, college is like a real road. The finish line for everyone is different, the ways and paths to reach that line are different. The rules are uncertain, accidents more common, and the course unpredictable. Yet, if you suddenly pick up the racer and tell them to drive on the road, they are bound to crash. That, in no way, means that they do not know how to drive. It just means that they have been driving on a well-defined track, and driving on the road is just not the same.
School is like a bubble, it’s far away from reality, it limits our creativity and reasoning. But college is a little closer to reality.
The difference between the racer and the student is that the racer knows that being unable to drive on the road does not imply that they are a poor driver, they just need to adjust to the reality of the road and move forward. But, the students in the academic world still have marks, and the perception of worth attached to it. While we are pushed into reality all of a sudden, the unrealistic measuring tape is still very much there.
I can just hope that we are able to adjust to the changes before it’s too late.