The pandemic has posed tremendous challenges on all fronts. The life of students, be it medical, engineering, arts or economics, is not exempted.
It has caused anxiety due to uncertainties about the future. Nonetheless, they need to keep going. What is the one character strength that predicts success in these challenging times?
Dr Angela Lee Duckworth — an American academic and psychologist with a mission of advancing the science and practice of character development — studied children and adults from different challenging environments over the years and concluded that grit was the significant predictor of success among numerous factors that influenced learning.
Grit, according to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, is defined as "firmness of mind or spirit: unyielding courage in the face of hardship or danger".
Grit enables individuals to persevere despite challenges and hardships in weird, unseen and untoward circumstances for years to achieve their long-term goals.
Grit in our students today can keep them going into their bright future. The four paragons of grit are interest, practice, purpose and hope.
First, students need to have an interest in the subject and passion in learning. The zeal to know more about something keeps them going no matter what. Interest is the very beginning of passion, and it proceeds to the next three paragons of grit.
The second exemplar is deliberate practice. It involves disciplined hard work beyond fun and enjoyment in the task to become better.
Students need to study hard and revise the subject many times. The constant positive feedback from mentors will entail incremental improvements day after day.
The third archetype of grit is having a purpose. It amalgamates with the individual's personality, identity and values. It defines the individual's existence in society and impact on the world.
The purpose becomes the mission. Every student is on a mission to contribute to his field to make the world better.
Fourth is hope. Hope needs to be maintained throughout. The science of hope has matured over the last 15 years. Human beings are creatures of the future.
They are not slaves of the past as quoted by Dr Martin Saligman, an American psychologist and educator. Hope in a better tomorrow is what keeps one going.
The secret is having a growth mindset and a positive attitude. The constant hope drives the students through the long journey of education to lifelong learning as professionals.
These four paragons of grit are amenable. The research by Dr Angela Lee shows that grit can be taught and it can grow too.
If one is interested in something and is passionate about it, with deliberate practice, hard work and perseverance, one can find a calling in it. It may not be a smooth run, but every time one falls, one will get up and continue going to achieve the goal.
In today's world of uncertainties, setbacks are inevitable, but how one deals with the setbacks or failures decides the outcome.
As in the famous saying, when the going gets tough, the tough get going. For success, the failures should act as learning chapters in the book of life.
The onus lies on educationists to change the label of failure. The educationists need to teach the students not only to be smarter, but to be grittier.
What one eventually accomplishes may depend on passion and perseverance more than on innate talent. The courage to repeat the endeavour after failure when others have lost hope is central to success.
The notion should be supported by our culture and institutions, especially the higher education fraternity. Various interventions and strategies can be implemented to encourage grit. However, success lies in the quality of interactions and interventions.
For instance, mastery-structured classrooms should be encouraged more than the performance-structured classrooms. In mastery-structured classrooms, students tend to relate failures to lack of effort.
They value practice, work harder and persist at academic tasks. On the other hand, students in performance-structured classrooms attribute their failures to a lack of talent. They are more likely to procrastinate.
The emphasis should be on creating an environment that encourages the value of learning for the sake of learning.
The learning environment should inspire students to sustain interest and persevere towards long-term goals. Such an environment should not penalise mistakes.
The writer is senior lecturer, Anaesthesiology Department, Faculty of Medicine, AIMST University