Full Speed Ahead! Prepare for Continued Academic Success
You’ve learned a lot this term, scoring successes and facing challenges that gave you valuable new insights. But as a first-year college student, you’ve still got a long academic future ahead of you. As you take more courses, you’ll continue strengthening the transferable skills and attitudes essential for success. This class has helped you lay a foundation that you can build on as you continue on your academic journey. But how, exactly, can you build on that foundation? Keep achieving goals. Adapt to new challenges. And stay connected with your supports.
Keep Achieving Goals
Goal setting is an ongoing process. You don’t just set goals for one term, achieve them, congratulate yourself, and call it a day. Rather, as you go through college, you constantly define new goals, review your progress toward those goals, and revise them as needed. The following tips can help you remain a goal-setting pro, long after this class concludes.
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Remember that you’re in charge. This term we’ve suggested setting goals related to the book’s chapter topics, but as you move forward in your academic career, the goal-setting process won’t be so structured. You’ll be responsible for defining your own goals and tracking your own progress. If this sounds a little scary, remember: You have the resources, skills, and self-knowledge you need to define your own path. For example, you can use the PSP to guide you all the way to graduation — and beyond.
Connect your short- and long-term goals. Step back occasionally from the day-to-day grind of college, and ask yourself what short-term goals you can accomplish now to keep working toward your long-term goals.
Luis is a case in point. During the first term, his PSP goals included maintaining a high GPA, developing a strong support network of peers and faculty mentors, and gaining experiences that would prepare him to work in counseling. In the second term, Luis set a goal to practice the study skills he developed in his first term so that he could continue maintaining a high GPA. To support his goal of broadening his network, he set new goals to interview his psychology instructors about their research interests and attend student council meetings. And to support his long-term goal of working in counseling, he set a new goal to volunteer with his community’s crisis hotline.
Reframe setbacks. Did you have a perfect term, accomplishing all the goals you set for yourself? If so, you can skip to the next section! If not, remind yourself that most people experience a few setbacks as they work toward their goals. As you’ve seen throughout this book, instead of viewing setbacks as failures, you can reframe them as opportunities for future success by analyzing what caused you to fall short — and identifying changes you can make to get the results you want.
Using Table 14.6 as a model, list two goals that you were unable to achieve this term. For each goal, note something positive you learned about yourself as you tried to achieve the goal. And if you still want to achieve the goal, write down what you’ll do differently next term to accomplish it.
FURTHER READING: For more information on how reframing can affect motivation, refer to the article “Regain Your Motivation by Reframing the Small Stuff” by James Ullrich (Psychology Today, October 29, 2014).
FURTHER READING: Read the Huffington Post article “5 Spectacular Examples of Turning Failure into Success.” The article briefly covers how individuals such as Steve Jobs and J. K. Rowling were able to overcome failure to achieve great accomplishments.
| A goal I didn’t achieve this term | Something positive I learned as I tried to achieve this goal | What I’ll do differently to achieve this goal next term |
|---|---|---|
| 1. | ||
| 2. |
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Adapt to New Challenges
Now that you’ve spent time celebrating your successes and reflecting on the insights you gained from tackling challenges, it’s time to consider how you’ll keep learning and growing during the remainder of your college career. As you progress in school, you’ll face new kinds of challenges: For one thing, your classes may not have the formal structure that this class had, so it may be harder to know how to prioritize your learning. What’s more, as you take higher-level courses, your instructors will assign longer papers, and your tests and reading assignments will become more difficult.
Fortunately, during this term you’ve built foundational skills that you can use to adapt to the challenges you’ll encounter during the rest of your academic career. Here are some tips.
ACTIVITY: Encourage students to schedule the strategies from this section into their calendar. Adding a fifteen-minute slot to their calendar each week can remind them to complete these important tasks.
Hit the “pause” button. Research suggests that reflection is an important component of learning,1 so schedule time throughout each term to reflect on your “big ticket” items: the demands you’re facing, your goals and action plans, the barriers you’re working to overcome, and the progress you’re making. Think of these sessions as hitting the “pause” button so that you can focus on the major events in your life. Use this time to take stock of what’s most meaningful to you. Your values, interests, skills, and goals can change over time; revisit them periodically to be certain that you’re pursuing the major and courses that appeal to you most.
Take motivation time outs. Once a week, stop for a moment to consider which tasks motivate you and which ones don’t. Connect the nonmotivating tasks to a long-range goal — for example, “If I read this boring article carefully enough, I’ll be better equipped to pass the test. If I pass enough tests, I’ll pass the course, which I need for my major.” Once you’ve completed those nonmotivating tasks, reward yourself.
Stay positive. Celebrate your successes and look for positive life lessons when things don’t go as you’d hoped. Remember: You can learn as much or more from setbacks and disappointments as you can from your successes.
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THE POWER OF OPTIMISM
spotlight onresearch
As we note in the chapter on personal and financial health, stress is a normal part of college life (as well as work life). Psychologists have long searched for insights on how to manage stress, and a recent study by Michelle Krypel and Donna Henderson-King suggests that optimism — having hope and confidence about your future — can help. The researchers asked more than three hundred undergraduate students from a midwestern university to complete measures of optimism, stress, and coping. Here’s what they found.
Students with low levels of optimism were more likely to report being stressed in school than those with higher levels of optimism. Students who were more optimistic were more likely to report low levels of stress.
The more optimistic students felt better equipped and more confident in their ability to manage — or cope with — their stress.
THE BOTTOM LINE
When you’re optimistic about your future, you may feel less stressed overall and more confident in handling stress when it does occur.
REFLECTION QUESTIONS
Question 14.1
1. Do you consider yourself an optimistic person? Why or why not?
Question 14.2
2. How optimistic are you about your next term at college? About your life after graduation? Explain your answers.
Question 14.3
3. Do you feel confident in your ability to manage the stress that happens in your life? Why or why not?
M. N. Krypel and D. Henderson-King, “Stress, Coping Styles, and Optimism: Are They Related to Meaning of Education in Students’ Lives?,” Social Psychology of Education 13 (2010): 409–24.
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Stay Connected to Your Supports
Success is a team sport, and you’ve started building your all-star support team this term, including your instructors, an academic adviser, family, and friends. You’ll continue building your team in college as you gain new experiences and as your needs change. For example, if you take a difficult math class next term, you might add a math tutor to your roster of connections. Or if you need help with a challenging term paper, you can visit the writing center. To keep building your support team, try these strategies.
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ACTIVITY: Remind students that now is the time to start building their network and that fellow classmates, especially in classes related to their major, can be great contacts. Have students set a goal to get two contacts from each of their classes. These classmates may be good resources both right away and once students enter the world of work.
Stay connected. At the start of each term, list the resources you may need to help you manage your course schedule as well as the personal and professional priorities you’re juggling. Each term, check in with an adviser to make sure you’re on track to graduate.
Connect early. Seek out help as soon as you recognize a need. For example, if you need more financial aid but you’re not sure what’s available and when the application has to be submitted, meet with someone in the financial aid office right away. Otherwise, you risk missing the deadline.
Find a mentor. A mentor can provide you with the information, advice, guidance, and feedback you need to help you grow. If you’re struggling with important academic decisions, such as what major to declare, a mentor can be a great sounding board. Mentors don’t get paid — they agree to this relationship because they feel they have something to share. A good mentor might be someone who has already taken one of the classes you’re in now (an advanced student), a person who knows the subject matter (an instructor), someone who graduated from your college (such as an older sibling or a neighbor), or an adviser.
Network. Take every opportunity to network — to meet and get to know new people. They can share valuable insights on such topics as schools you might want to transfer to, interesting job opportunities, and contacts with whom you can discuss careers that interests you.
ACTIVITY: Encourage students to join LinkedIn groups related to their career field of interest. The groups will allow them to participate in and follow discussions with people currently employed in these fields and to gain access to related articles and topics.
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