What I remember most about the first semester I attended college is the feeling I had that everyone around me knew something that I did not know. Though I had been a very successful high school student, I had a very hard time earning passing grades in my college courses. And after one semester, I dropped out.
When I began teaching college students, I met many bright people whose potential thrilled me. But so many of the students I met could not seem to do the work they needed to do to succeed in college. These students failed to come to class or consistently arrived late, did not do their homework, were disruptive in class, and refused to seek out and take advantage of all the additional support available to them for their studies.
My experiences with these students convinced me their failures to perform had little to do with their intellectual abilities. Rather, some students simply seem programmed to automatically self-sabotage their efforts. I often wondered what I could do to help these students stay focused on their studies so that they might reap the benefits that accompany academic success.
As I continued to pursue my understanding of human development and psychology, both through formal and informal education, I began to understand the way our early life experiences shape the way we go through life as both teenagers and adults. All people are born with unique gifts and talents that are not common to everyone. But what we do share is the capacity to learn and grow. However, our early life experiences impact that capacity, which in turn impacts our ability to succeed in institutions of learning.
These three secrets to academic success reflect my understanding of what made me, and so many of my students, different from students for whom college success comes easily. I present them in a way I hope will help you to understand how early life experiences contribute to patterns of action and reaction that are continually being reinforced throughout adulthood, unless we consciously make efforts to change them. What I offer here are some basic explanations of the ways our mindsets are shaped by early life experiences and the impact that these mindsets have on our capacity to learn and grow as adults. Hopefully, you will find these explanations illuminate the reasons for some of your own struggles to succeed in school and give you hope that you too can achieve academic success.