Failure: At some point everyone gets a taste of it, but that doesn’t make it any easier to stomach. When I was in high school, I was a 4.0 student, on the honor roll every semester and graduated summa cum laude—the whole shebang. The thought of failing a course was entirely foreign to me. Then I came to college. During the fall semester of my freshman year at UW-Madison, I failed my first course; not the “Oh dude I totally failed that class, haha” but an actual F-on-the-transcript failure. I felt awful. Without the certainty of my stellar string of A’s, I was lost. So for anyone else in the red looking to come back to the black, the first thing to do is figure out why you failed.
You procrastinated
We’ve all been there. Procrastination is practically a disease in college, and if you’ve got access to Netflix, the prognosis may be terminal.
What to do now:
Cut out the distractions. Find a study buddy who actually makes you study. Go to campus tutoring sessions and study groups. Turn off Friends and get your work done and in on time. Admittedly, I still have Netflix, HBOGo and HuluPlus religiously bookmarked in my browser like a shrine to ancient pagan gods, but here’s hoping that you fare better than little hypocritical me.
You hate the material
For me, this was a huge factor. I started college with the intention of being a genetics major and my schedule was loaded with hard science and math credits. Three years later, I will be graduating with a B.A. in English so, as you might imagine, my freshman year classes were pretty much my worst nightmare. No, I don’t know what I was thinking either.
What to do now:
Make sure you learn from my mistakes. Ask yourself, does the material actually interest you? If it doesn’t, find another major. Part of what makes college so valuable is that it gives you the chance to discover not only what you love, but what you hate. Don’t let expectations—your own or others’—dictate what you should study.
You don’t understand the material
This may go hand-in-hand with #2, but sometimes you may love what you’re learning and still don’t fully comprehend it. Black holes really speak to my soul, but how the hell do they work!?
What to do now:
Hit up tutoring services, your TA and even your professor. Going to office hours can be intimidating, but if you show a genuine desire to learn the material, your professor will be happy to help you. Honestly, most professors are just happy to see students at all during office hours. Visit with them. Talk to them. Learn from them. They won’t bite.
You’re struggling with your mental health
Nobody wants to admit to this. I didn’t; it wasn’t until I was facing the possibility of academic probation that I actually sucked it up and scheduled a meeting with a counselor at the mental health clinic on campus. Depression and anxiety are far more common on college campuses than you might think, and they don’t just affect your academics: They affect everything.
What to do now:
For me, counseling was a godsend. It wasn’t some miracle cure by any means, but having someone there who cared and listened helped me end the semester without any additional F’s in my ledger. There are always people willing to help you—especially your professors, believe it or not—and you should never let the stigma surrounding mental illness prevent you from getting the help you need. Whether it’s counseling, medication, some much needed time off or some combination of the three, please allow yourself the chance to heal.
An “F’” isn’t the end of your college career as you know it, despite how it might seem to you now. Focus your attention on why you failed so you can determine what kind of help you might need. I ended my freshman year on the edge of academic probation, and I’ll be graduating with honors in May. So take it from me—don’t let your failures define you.
