Engineering Students
Aspiring for perfect grades is bad for our mental health.
A US study found that 80 per cent of surveyed students based their sense of self-worth on their grades.
The lower engineering students grades, the lower their self esteem
And when grading systems in engineering colleges are dependent on so many variables, it’s a very precarious and dangerous measure of value.
One of the largest studies into engineering students’ mental health in Australia revealed that 70 per cent of respondents rated their health as ‘fair’ or ‘poor’.
79 per cent of engineering students suffered from anxiety, 75.8 per cent suffered from low moods, and 59.2 per cent experienced feelings of hopelessness and worthlessness.
And even if school is the sole cause poor mental health for some engineering students…
These challenges inevitably infiltrate other areas of young people’s lives:
Including their social life, home life, physical health and future career or study prospects.
Find a job: That’s the first thing we do when we graduate and get out of engineering school, or after we pass our licensure examinations.
We do some research, and prepare the best resume we could.
Once our CV or resumes have been acknowledged by our target companies, more often than not we’re required to send them our university transcripts.
We’re called up for an interview, and sometimes one of the questions would be something like: “I see that you took Thermodynamics twice. What could’ve caused this?” or something similar.
If there’s one thing we engineers find annoying, it’s when people judge our abilities purely by our grades.
Grades are important—Yes, absolutely! But, grades are only a part of an engineer’s true potential.
First of all, unlike other fields, engineering is not a perfectly theoretical field.
There is no single correct answer to a problem, we can generate hundreds of answers with different solutions and prove that they are all correct!
Engineers thrive on trial and error. We think out of the box. We invent. We test. We fail. We try again, until we get the answer we need!
As a result, we sometimes get mediocre grades or sometimes we fail, but we never give up.
We are not defined by how high or low our grades are.
We may have failed different classes numerous times, and we’ve learned from our mistakes for sure.
We’ve gone through sleepless nights of studying, grueling hours of trying to get that design to work, sleeping in class because we spent all night studying, we turn into creative zombies, we’ve been through a lot—and we’ve graduated!
In the complicated, survival of the fittest, world of engineering, isn’t our diploma good enough to prove that we’re more than capable?
I’m not saying that grades aren’t an important criteria, I’m just saying that it’s unfair to base judgement purely on how high or low our grades are.
Failing Mechanics, Calculus or any other subject does not make us under-qualified. What’s important is, we’ve learned from our mistakes, we retook the subjects, passed it and graduated!
Engineers are defined by the content of their minds, the applications of their wisdom, the depth of their heart. The world will judge your legacy, not by your grades.
Academic success: Is it just about the grades?
The concept of academic success has generally been associated with the attainment of summative assessments, as stipulated by learning outcomes.
However, York, Gibson, and Rankin (2015) argue that the meaning of this term is debatable as it has an ‘amorphous’ identity, depending on varying subjective perspectives.
Indeed, while academic success can be attributed to the attainment of knowledge demonstrated through high assessment grades, it can also refer to the graduates’ capacity to secure a professional role related to their degree.
After analysing the literature on the use of this terminology in different subject fields, York et al. identify six elements which define it namely: ‘academic achievement, engagement in educationally purposeful activities, satisfaction, acquisition of desired knowledge, skills and competencies, persistence, attainment of educational outcomes, and post-college performance’.
More Engineering Grades
Confessions: Why My Grades Didn’t Matter After Engineering College
