What does success mean to you? It’s a question I often ask students during our sessions because understanding their definition of success is critical to their social-emotional well being. As you might imagine, the responses I hear are varied. Some respond with a long pregnant pause, confused by the question; others immediately answer with metrics and specifics focused on financial and material wealth (car, house, income, etc). Interestingly, no one describes measures of their personal happiness or improving their community. This is the moment when I start to get excited (yes, I truly love what I do 🙂). 

After asking some probative followup questions, I am quickly able to poke and prod at their ideas of success. All too often we determine a person’s success by their net worth, material possessions, and public persona. I challenge these preconceptions asking about how individual success might be determined by their growth, their impact, and their joy. These are measures that are harder to quantify and explain, yet likely have a greater positive impact on one’s social-emotional health.  Ultimately my goal is to usher them on a journey of self-discovery where they learn to judge personal success on their terms, rather than someone else’s.

Let’s Define Success

Miriam-Webster states that success is “1) degree or measure of succeeding, 2) favorable or desired outcome, and 3) the attainment of wealth, favor, or eminence.” According to Google, the archaic definition of success is “the good or bad outcome of an undertaking.”

As I read these definitions the first thing I notice is their subjectivity. Using terms like “good or bad,” “degree or measure of succeeding,” and “favorable or desired” or even “wealth, favor, or eminence” are up to the individual to define. That said, when I look at various historical figures and modern-day influencers I often see success framed around material possessions and financial assets. Muted are those who reference more qualitative measures like personal happiness and positive impact on others. 

I’m not entirely sure that I have a succinct explanation as to why that is. I’m sure Google Scholar would populate hundreds of academic articles that offer sociological, philosophical, and anthropological insights. The best uninformed opinion I can offer is that it’s easier for our brains to process numbers as value, versus the deep and meaningful personal values, ethics, and morals that drive our behavior.

What Does This Mean For Students?

For students, success is readily defined around grades, test scores, rank-in-class, school type, course type, and college admission. These are data points which are easily quantified, and thus have meaning and value. We can quantify the number of honors and AP classes a student has taken. We can determine the quality of their performance based on a grading scale. College rankings provide us with a hierarchy of what is the “best” college or university. 

Rarely do we measure a student’s educational success around more holistic measures, like growth. For instance, if we expanded the definition of success to include things like increases from one point in time to another, learning from failures, stretching beyond their comfort zone, having positive impacts on the community, and pursuit in realizing their passion, we might find that a student’s self-worth and contributions have longer term positive impacts on their trajectory.

Should Student Success Shun Grades?

My simple answer is, no. My proposal is much simpler–though not easily done. When I work with students who experience academic challenges for the first time, I start to unpack their social emotional response. The reason is because of the unintended outcome of defining success on quantitative measures like grades and test scores. Students, over time, connect their personal worth and value to the grades they earn. In other words, their mind rationalizes that since they earned a “bad grade”, it means they are a “bad person”. 

To adults, this probably sounds a little like “2 + 2 = bananas” because our minds operate in irrational ways. So I work with students to help them redefine grades as a benchmark or data point. Instead of using it to evaluate their goodness or badness, I explain how it merely indicates performance and understanding of a specific topic at a specific time. Grades are not a representation of that student’s personal value.  If we chart these data points, we can start to see some trends. Just as one might do when analyzing a data-set of any kind. Furthermore, we can use it to identify areas for improvement–which in turn means those data points can be moved, to show improvements over time. 

Re-frame Success

Years ago a colleague of mine asked a simple yet compelling question when talking with students about success. He shared that instead of asking “what do I want to be when I grow up,” they should instead ask themselves “who do I want to be when I grow up?” As someone who had been working in education for nearly 15 years at that point, I was dumbfounded. 

Of course our character is more important than anything else. Our achievements should align with our beliefs, rather than define them. This of course lends itself nicely to Simon Sinek’s work around starting with why. He argues that the more successful companies, organizations, and people have a clear understanding of their purpose; or in his view, why they are doing what they are doing. From there they then figure out what they’re doing and how to do it.

It’s one of the reasons I specifically ask students “why do you want to go to college?” Too often, the responses are littered with stutters, ahhs, and ums. No one has ever asked them why, it’s always just assumed that college was the next step. While this may be true, as a student understands why they want to go to college, they are then better prepared to be successful in college. College isn’t another achievement, it’s another opportunity to pursue knowledge and experiences which contribute to their personal definition of success.

How Should Students Define Success?

In all honesty, I wish there was some universal definition of success for students which created a healthy influence on their self-confidence and performance. The reality is there isn’t. In truth, and probably as it should be, a student’s definition of success is deeply personal. It must bring together the morals and values instilled in their upbringing, along with institutional metrics like grades. Where we must be vigilant is in the analysis of those elements, remembering that there is a middle ground between individual performance and universally accepted measures of success. The underlying metrics and values are personal to each individual student.

We must also remember that students aren’t robots or computers–that their performance is influenced by things within and out of their control. In other words, they will not perform on a measurably consistent basis after learning and studying. Their emotions, nutrition, sleep, mental health, and so on play a part in how a student performs because they are, after all, human beings. Furthermore, students cannot control how difficult a teacher makes a test. Nor can they control the teacher’s interpretation of their own grading rubric. 

My Advice?

First, focus on accepting where a student is, instead of where you think they should be. This allows for constructive and productive discussions around how to improve. I think it’s safe to say that no student wants to earn a C, D, or F. However, if that’s the case, start to figure out what is and isn’t working. Open the student up to seeking out support from tutors, teachers, and counselors. Second, start reframing a student’s definition of success. Have them look inward in order to look outward. Have them scrutinize what they enjoy, what they are good at, and how they can use those gifts to achieve their aspirations. From there, then look to what experiences and opportunities are needed to grow their strengths so they may take steps to achieving their goals. It allows for discussions about how their classes, and performance in those classes, will help them become successful mechanics, doctors, teachers, contractors, financiers, politicians, and technicians.

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