Exams Around the Corner : Can we prepare our youngsters to face Failures?

Every year, during this period - exam period (March - May) - we witness a growing problem of students who are more stressed than ever.  Students expectations and anxiety to perform well in their exams and to cope up with the unending demands from their parents and society, takes its toll, during exam time. Therefore it is no wonder that every one, including the Honourable Prime Minister, Shri Narendra Modi ji, have tried to address young students and advised them not to be overly stressed. Despite all efforts, most unfortunately, we are seeing tragic incidents of students resorting to extreme steps and taking away their lives due to failures or  perceived fear of failures. India, unfortunately has one of the highest rates of suicide among people aged between 15 and 29. Although the reasons are myriad but fear of failure is one primary reason, which is a major cause for many young students taking away their lives. The pressure from parents for their child to do well in class XII board exams is intense and so is it for most other competitive exams. There have been many incidents in the past where students have committed suicide during exams and on the result day, yet we are unable to destress our students. Why are failures or fear of failure so extreme that students decide to end their lives?  Psychologists suggest that students suffer from anxiety and traumatic disorders relating to fear of failure in examination. The fear factor is the reason why students suffer from anxiety, depression, and the followed consequences. This fear arises from the societal pressure, school and parents, which go to extreme levels in pushing children to get better and better grades, and fear of failure to do so, lead to detrimental consequences. Most unfortunately the best time of the student's lives - school and college education -  which they should be enjoying and cherishing, has now turned out to be a time, which becomes unbearably stressful for many.

Failures are inextricably linked to ones life as much as success, and this is one constant for which there are no aberrations. But then it is a different matter as to how well we are trained to handle failures in comparison with success. With an ever increasing aspirations of young students, egged by an unending demand from the school authorities, peers and parents to excel in exams and to perform exceedingly well, our students are stressed  out completely and for them success has now been so very narrowly defined. It means nothing other than scoring those magical numbers all in excess of 90% and higher or getting through those highly competitive entrance exams to fetch a coveted seat in the elite educational institutions.  Any thing less is considered a failure, a word which most unfortunately does not find a place in any of the lexicons meant for the students, their teachers, schools, peers, parents and everyone else. It is therefore but natural that we read about those most horrific cases of students choosing to end their life due to failures or fear of failure. The parental pressure and an Himalayan expectations that their wards unrealistically expect from them, lead to stressful atmosphere for the students. Most of us know and learn how to handle  our success - by celebrations and what not, but then our modern education system does not in any way prepare our students to face challenges, which would necessarily and mandatorily include failures. Can we not start teaching our youngsters to cope with failures, which are as integral to our lives as successes are? Sooner we start teaching our students to cope with failures better it is  for the nation and more young and productive lives will be saved.

How ill  prepared we are when it comes to handling failures, was evidenced when most print and electronics media went all out to cover  the suicide case, leading to the tragic death of V G Siddharth, the entrepreneur of Cafe Coffee Day fame, who took the extreme step and committed suicide. He was one of those who was not prepared to face, effectively,  failure. “I have failed” and “I gave up”, with these dreaded words in a signed, kind of a suicide letter, Siddhartha took the extreme step of jumping into the Netravati River and his body was fished out of the river on July 31st, last year. When a fairly successful businessman like Siddharth  could not cope with failures, one can imagine what stress levels are for our young students on whom there is so much of a prenatal and societal pressure to perform well in exams, particularly the board exam and competitive entrance exams in a highly skewed demand vs supply situation in the elite schools, like the IITs in India.

Everybody fails and there are no exceptions to this cardinal dictum and Siddharth was no different and so will it be for the rest of us with. I exceptions. The difference lies in how one faces failures; what one person sees as a debilitating disappointment, another may turn it into an opportunity. Unfortunately in the case of Siddharth, unrelenting pressure from investors and creditors, as well as alleged harassment from tax authorities  resulted in his extreme form of disappointment leading destiny to play its unscheduled role, which was aided by the inability of Siddharth to handle failures. The lesson that we all must learn, from this tragic incident and so also from innumerable other suicide cases of students that are reported every year, is to devise a mechanism at the school level to prepare our young students, particularly those who are appearing for their board exams, to prepare themselves to face failures as much as they are prepared for handling successes. We must cement a thought to learn to appreciate that failure is integral to ones life and just as we celebrate successes, we must learn to handle failures in life, which are faced even by the so called high and mighty.

History is abound with failures and some of the most brilliant minds have failed. The best example of which can be seen in Thomas Edison, by far one of the most famous inventors in history. He holds more than one thousand patents and is a name one grows up listening to when it comes to inventions. However, legend has it that while attempting to invent a commercially-viable electric lightbulb, Edison failed more than 10,000 times. When asked how it felt to fail so many times, he merely stated, “I have not failed that many times, rather I have not failed even once. I have succeeded in proving that those 10,000 ways the system will not work. When I have eliminated the ways that the electric bulb will not work, I am certain that I will certainly find the way that it will work.” A profound way to look at failures and be prepared to learn from failures, which can be a stepping stone for our successes. In one of the most discouraging statement on failures and worst teaching practice of all time, Thomas Edison was told by his teachers, he was ‘too stupid to learn anything’. 

In his best selling book Brilliant Blunders, Mario Livio, unfolds a fascinating story of blunders committed by the best of minds in the world of science. The author in his scholarly insightful work on the lives of five great scientists, Charles Darwin, Lord Kelvin, Linus Pauling, Fred Hoyle, and Albert Einstein, speaks of the colossal mistakes committed by these great scientists, who made ground breaking contributions, which changed our understanding of the life and our universe. While it is fashionable to bask in the glory of success and advocate books and articles that speak of success, it may be equally important to ask our students to read books on failures and prepare them to face failures as much as successes, which will be the best way forward to prepare our youngsters to face challenges of modern life.

Modern world is full of challenges and in order to face today’s extremely complex and multifaceted challenges, we need an overall new attitude towards failure. This is an important issue which needs to be promoted in our society. This must start very early and right at the school education system itself. We need to openly recognize and promote the overall lack of predictability that comes with most real life challenges in the modern world and fundamentally alter the way in which we view and approach failure. We must prepare our youngsters to be better equipped to engineering the fail, which will allow them to master the inextricable linkage of failures in life and prepare them to face challenges of failures.

We must inform and educate our youngsters that even the best of minds have failed. Take for example Srinivas Ramanujan, the naturally gifted, untraditional mathematician ( 1887-1920), who too faced several failures in life not withstanding the fact that he was befittingly hailed as an all-time great mathematician and is famously clubbed with the other international greats like Euler, by his discoverer G H Hardy. Srinivas Ramanujan, was born to a poor orthodox Tamil Brahmin family on the 22nd of December, 1887 in Erode, Tamilnadu. His father worked as a clerk in a cloth merchants shop in Kumbakonam. When he was just 2 years old, Ramanujan contracted smallpox. Ramanujan confronted a life of extreme poverty during his younger days. The major turning point in the life of Ramanujan came when he came across a mathematics book by G S Carr called ‘Synopsis of elementary results in pure mathematics’. Although this book changed the course of his life, yet this very book was responsible for his failures in all but mathematics subject in his college days. Ramanujan became exceedingly interested in maths at the cost of other subjects. The result was expected. He failed in all the subjects in college except excelling in maths. The failure did not help his cause and he had to loose the much need scholarship that he had managed to get while joining the college. Failure played on his mind and he ran away from home only to return back to get enrolled at Pachaiyappa’s college in Chennai. Here, too, he engaged himself mostly in maths and couldn’t comprehend subjects like physiology and once again failed in the BA Fine Arts exam. He had no way but to leave his college, without attaining a degree but he continued his independent Mathematics research. Rest we all know is now history and Ramanujan is now classified as one of the all time great mathematician of all time. 

There are several other examples of people who have failed but were not deterred in their goal to succeed. Steven Spielberg, maker of Jurassic Park and such other extraordinarily successful films and winner of several Academy Awards, was rejected by the University of Southern California’s School of Cinematic Arts. In one of the most profound statements on failures, J K Rowling - writer says “It is impossible to live without failing at something, unless you live so cautiously that you might as well not have lived at all – in which case, you fail by default.” Micheal Jordon, one of the all time best basket ball players, is another classic example who overcame failures. He says ‘I have failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed.’ Amitabh Bachchan, arguably the the biggest superstar India has ever produced, moved to Mumbai, where he tried his luck in film industry, but due to his unconventional look and great height he was rejected by many, He also tried to become a Radio jockey but due to his ‘heavy voice’ he was rejected by the All India Radio. He was undeterred, and after a lot of hard work and patience Amitabh Bachchan went on to become what he now is the super star. 

Failure is the other side of the coin, which has success on one side and it is as integral to everyone’s life as success. So don’t just waste your time in worrying about failures be prepared to face it head on as did so many others a few of whose examples I have quoted in this article. Wishing all youngsters all the very best for their exams.