March 17, 2010
HOW TO FAIL
FEEL GOOD BEING BAD
BY LAURA NYMAN
A week or so ago, I found myself writing a test for my grade eleven Functions class—describing in inordinate detail the principal that as probability of success de-creases, probability of failure increases. I definitely felt my probability of success de-creasing as I faked my way through twenty questions on sine curves, and turned in my eraser-marked, crumpled and torn test. I was surprised to find, however, that my pending failure wasn‘t accompanied by any kind of regret or guilt. Rather, I skipped down the hallway towards a well-earned lunch period. I was nearly giddy.
It‘s not as if I‘ve ever been an ―average‖ student. Far from it. I remember the first, and only, failing grade I‘ve ever received on an assignment: an angry red ―R‖ carved into an essay on the ordinary contractions of the diaphragm causing hiccups. I was in grade three, and I was scandalized.
Lately, however, I‘ve been experiencing a strange kind of trend after writ-ing—and bombing—particularly difficult tests. I have learned to take pleasure in my failure. My recent tests have been dismally grouped into two separate categories: exam practise (as in, learning to cope with failing is good practise for coping with exam results) and fridge-door decoration. In some perverse way, the former group brings me just as much pleasure as the latter, and for one simple reason: it feels good to be bad.
It‘s liberating, the momentary rebellion against expectations, and against the system. The space of a week in which the failure isn‘t yet confirmed on paper, and thus isn‘t yet a reality. There is a certain amount of pride, not in failing, but in not caring. High school is not always my first or foremost priority, no matter what my teachers and parents may believe, and failing a test (or two, or three) is evident proof of this. Even if my only aim is proving to myself that I have a life outside of William Lyon Mackenzie Collegiate Institute.
Despite our teachers‘ unwillingness to let the education system take the blame for our failing grades, success is completely dependant on the environment we learn in. At a school as especially academically superior as Mackenzie, it is the suc-cessful students who receive academic luxuries. Those of us with wide-eyed fear of the very real prospect of summer school are often forgotten by our teachers.
And, like so many things, failure becomes cyclical. Students are unwilling to be pushed towards better study habits and better grades, and teachers, frankly, are unwilling to push them. Failed tests certainly aren‘t spread out across the school; it is a select group of students who can claim responsibility for lowered standards and av-erages at Mac. But without encouragement, these students remain on their fast track, not to success, but to gifty-fiftys and perhaps, in a few years, gifty-diplomas.
Next time you get a bombed test back, I encourage you to accept your failing grade with a smile. Because, after all, it‘s not the mark, but the way you feel about the mark, which matters. A failed test does not equate to a failed semester. Besides, there are still four months, well, three…two and a half…two weeks…four days…until the exam. Let‘s call this one practise.
