The Mindset That Keeps Your Freshman From Academic Success (And Maybe Career Success Too)
“I am wondering why I received a 10-point deduction, considering I put in way more work than some of my classmates. I feel like I’m just being penalized for being efficient with my time,” the student respectfully shared.
A day earlier, this student contacted me, questioning why a project grade was so low. My first reaction was to groan. I cannot say that makes me a good teacher, but I can say this kind of conversation gets old very quickly.
As a student, I sometimes pinned teachers as being picky, perfectionists, or simply unfair. But in my years of teaching, I’ve realized how skewed my student mindset was. I had no idea the amount of effort instructors put into creating instructions and lesson plans, grading assignments, and working with students outside of class.
I sympathize with the student described above, because I was (at least on a few occasions) that student. What I’ve come to learn as a teacher is that this mindset or approach to education hinders students abilities to learn and grow. While I cannot say this student generally has an attitude of entitlement when it comes to grades, I can say that this request for a higher grade presents a current problem educators regularly face: academic entitlement.
What is academic entitlement?
Researchers Chowney and Campbell describe academic entitlement as “the tendency to possess an expectation of academic success without taking required personal responsibility for achieving the result.” In other words, this term implies that expectation of success is the main reasoning by which academically entitled students base their desire for a better grade.
This mindset is not hard to spot as a teacher, especially as the end of the semester approaches. However, this mindset can be harder for a college parent to identify, largely because you believe in your child’s abilities and want your child to succeed. Inevitably when your child describes a poor grade by which he is frustrated, you are only hearing one side of the story.
Sometimes your child may have poor teachers who need to get on top of their game, but in many cases your child’s teachers are fairly experienced and skilled in education. As a parent, please be careful not to badmouth a teacher or discredit a teacher without understanding both sides of the story. (Negative talk from a parent about an authority figure deeply impacts your freshman.)
So how do you know if your child is struggling with an academically entitled mindset? You will hear your freshman say things like . . .
“I don’t understand why I didn’t get a better grade. I worked ___ hours on it!”
“Some of classmates told me I gave the best presentation, so I don’t get why my grade isn’t higher.”
“I stayed up all night to study for this stupid test, but I only got a B-. My teacher is so unfair!”
Certainly there are situations in which your child can say these things and not be academically entitled. However, chances are that if he equates hours spent with a letter grade, he likely has at least a struggle with an academic mindset.
How do students perceive academic entitlement?
In a letter to the editor of the American Journal of Pharmaceutical Education, fourth year student Stephen Karpen shares this:
“While I am ultimately responsible for my own education, I cannot become a successful [professional] without help from the institution I attend and the faculty members who teach me. Students must understand paying tuition does not entitle them to a degree but rather the opportunity to learn . . . The most fundamental way a college can offer this is by ensuring the excellence of its educators . . . I expect my professors to have time set aside to address my needs. Professors should be available to clarify lectures and provide additional sources of information when needed. It is not a professor’s job to tutor a student individually, but I believe accessibility and willingness to provide tools to help a struggling student is crucial to being an effective educator.”
This perspective is helpful for both educators and parents alike. Academically driven students are willing to put in the hard work, to do what it takes to become a successful professional. What is most important to a student focused on learning is having the resources they need to succeed, namely an accessible and helpful educator.
How do teachers perceive academic entitlement?
Students like Stephen, unfortunately, are the exception in my experience. A student who approaches a course, even a course he or she inherently dislikes, with a desire to learn and grow is a dream to teach. Even when this student approaches the professor with challenging questions, the professor loves seeing him or her seek knowledge and growth. This type of student ultimately helps to raise the class to a whole new level.
The type of student, however, who makes appointments with an instructors most often (again in my experience) is not like Stephen. This type of student typically approaches a class as a transaction, a commercial exchange of goods and services. When a student perceives a class in this way, he or she typically also approaches the course with an academically entitled attitude.
Assistant Professor of Multimedia Journalism at Morgan State, Stacey Patton, describes this mindset from a teacher’s perspective:
“When many . . . students get to college, they lug into the classroom a sense of academic entitlement—a belief that their papers and exams should be graded on how hard they’ve worked, not how well they’ve mastered the material.”
As a teacher, I can tell you firsthand how frustrating it is to try to instruct this kind of a student. While I hope to establish a clear level of expectations at the beginning of a semester that my class is not a transaction, sometimes students do not buy in.
Inevitably, I have the same students repeatedly approach me after many assignments, tests, or projects begging for a better grade and giving the same reasoning—“but I worked so hard.” I do try to be understanding, but I also know that at times I need to maintain the standard of mastery and excellence if I truly want my students to be successful professionals. I know as a result I will never be the “fun” teacher or the “friend” teacher, but I know that is what is best for my students.
How does academic entitlement impact your college freshman’s education?
Learning is a mindset, not a stage of life. What an academically entitled college freshman misses is that he or she is cheating himself when he approaches a class with this mindset.
Your freshman is the one who is impacted most drastically by an entitled mindset. Approaching every class as a one-time transaction, a brief stop on the way to getting a job robs your freshman of the incredible experience that college offers. A college education is a chance, not to grow in one field, but to grow as a person, to explore different skills, to hone abilities, to pursue new avenues of learning, etc.
For many students, the full impact of this mindset may not sink in until the first after-college job. What this student will find is that he will repeatedly hit the same wall over and over again but this time with employers.
Working hard on a presentation is not the same as delivering the desired results. Spending hours trying to secure a high-profile client means little if an actual substantive relationship is not built. Employers will not buy this entitled mindset any more than a teacher would, and they may categorize this kind of employee as the type that does the bare minimum to get by—in other words, not promotion material.
What can you do to help correct this mindset?
“Whoever did this is a really good example of somebody who has lost all perspective and all sense of control,” stated Patrick Gallagher, the director of college counseling at Sidwell Friends School, when addressing the extreme behavior of the college admission scandal of 2019. While one would like to think that this behavior is the exception (and the Washington Post seems to believe this is generally the case) this behavior of doing everything you can to get your child ahead comes at a tremendous cost—an example of unethical and immoral behavior.
The real tragedy of the college admission scandal of 2019 and other similar situations is that these parents are teaching their children that ethics and morals are irrelevant or at least less important than getting what you want or what you believe you deserve.
Thinking “what I am doing is really fairly tame compared to parents like Laurie Loughlin” is probably a sign that you need to step back and regain perspective. Are your actions communicating an abandonment (however slight) of standards, morals, or ethics?
In an episode titled “Small Things Considered” of the podcast This American Life, Scott Brown shares about a trend among affluent families to request growth hormones for their short but healthy children. In an interview with a set of parents, Scott asks the parents to explain their reasoning behind having their son receive growth hormone treatments. They, in summary, see the few inches gained by these expensive injections as a way to help their children get ahead, to possibly prevent bullying, and give their children more confidence.
(On a personal note, this choice seems to contradict the popularity of body positivity messages which encourage children and adults to embrace their physical characteristics and appearance.)
While you may not pay upwards of $300,000 for growth hormones treatments or bribe school officials to get your child admitted to a prestigious college, be wary. Consider the ways in which you may be tempted to compromise, bend the rules, or find a way to make your child the exception.
Your actions speak much louder than your words, especially to your freshman. While you may be tempted to think your parenting days are over, dust your hands off, and say “I tried,” you have the ability to influence and guide your college freshman for the better.
