Academic Resilience Quotes

I was 17 the first time I set foot in a classroom, but 10 years later, I would graduate from Cambridge with a Ph.D. 'Educated' is the story of how I came by my education. It is also the story of how I lost my family.

Math was a two-part exam and I once didn't go for the second part. I knew I'd done so badly on the first it was hopeless. I re-took it about four or five times. I think I eventually got it by getting the top GCSE grade.

I taught myself algebra and a little grammar, and somehow I scraped a high enough score on the ACT to be admitted to Brigham Young University, even though I had no formal education.

I was a really good student, first, second grade, third grade, and then fourth grade a little bit. And then I don't know what happened. I became a very terrible student. I wish I took it more serious.

Take a random group of 8-year-old American and Japanese kids, give them all a really, really hard math problem, and start a stopwatch. The American kids will give up after 30, 40 seconds. If you let the test run for 15 minutes, the Japanese kids will not have given up. You have to take it away.

I've taught fifth-year Christmas leavers last thing on a Friday afternoon. Basically, if you can face that you can face anything.

From age 16 on, I found school boring and failed A-level Physics at my first attempt. This was necessary for university entrance, and so I stayed an extra year to repeat it. This time, I did splendidly and was admitted to Sheffield University, my first choice because of their excellent Chemistry Department.

If more students use self-compassion to reframe their failures, they may discover more nourishing sources of motivation and healthier strategies to pursue their goals.

The important thing is the educational experience itself — how to survive it.

Scholarship was one thing, drudgery another. I very soon concluded that nothing would induce me to read, let alone make notes on, hundreds and hundreds of very, very, very boring books.

I got kicked out of high school, went to 3 different high schools and summer school and extra night school just so I could maybe graduate and try to make it up, because I flunked pretty much my entire freshman year, mainly because I just never showed up.

You have to have a patience for college.