1

Perla Ramirez Calixto

Instructor Reader

ENG 111 W02

12 February 2024

Summary of and Response to “Coping with Failure”

I was always considered an overachieving student throughout my middle/high school

years. I became friends with classmates who felt the same way I did toward schools. However,

many don't take into consideration the emotions that overachieving students experience when

they come across an academic mistake or failure. One article that emphasizes these struggles is

the article “Coping with Failure” by Darcy A. Santor. The introduction highlights how

reoccurring and likely it is to encounter academic failures and how some students have poor

reactions towards it causing their mental health to deteriorate. Through this article, Santor

examines the importance for schools to reach out the extra hand to students who challenge a lack

of coping skills towards moments of failure.

The beginning of the article highlights the possible reasoning as to why high achievers

are so avoidant of academic failures, “results of this study identified five different types of

negative appraisals associated with failure, including fear of embarrassment, fear of losing the

interest of others, fear of an uncertain future, fear of upsetting others, and fear of a loss of

self-worth.” (Santor, 2020) Santor highlights why students put this sense of pressure on

themselves. This is important to consider because society tends to believe it is an

attention-seeking manner that causes students to belittle themselves with poor grades. After all,

this perspective is not common among all students.

 2

Furthermore, Santor claims all the methods that students have found to cope. Some

methods that students resorted to after an academic failure consisted of crying, distracting

themselves, asking for more help, avoiding tasks, or opening communication with the teacher.

Reviewing the coping mechanisms has shown a pattern “We hypothesized that these four

domains of coping behavior would be distinct, at least to some degree (H1). Given that they are

all failure-coping behaviors, some association among the scales would not be unexpected.”

(Santor, 2020) It is clear to see that each student has a unique way of coping with the same issue.

However, some students had coping strategies that were not as healthy compared to other

available options.

Santor finishes their article by summarizing the importance that educational institutions

take the time to recognize when a student is poorly coping with academic losses. Due to the

coping mechanisms that some students lean towards, Santor does not state that one is better than

another. She claims that there is no right way to cope with failure but it should be critical to the

individual to understand what exactly is causing them to react in this manner.

In this article, Santor claims that the reaction that high-achieving students have toward

failure does tend to remain and go unnoticed in educational facilities. As a high-achieving

student throughout my schooling, I have excelled as much as I could. However, being a senior

and figuring out how my educational career will continue will not always consist of constant

wins. When I experienced moments of failure people had this view that I was asking for a sense

of attention to the low score, when the reality is that I was doing my best to avoid this feeling of

devastation. Santor recognizing that these reactions are not for attention but can affect my mental

health I felt was validating. I don't know many people with the same issues as failures so I felt

like I was seen and heard.

 3

Halfway through my senior year, I was applying for scholarships and full rides at colleges

that I was interested in. However, when I found out that I got rejected for a big scholarship at the

school I wanted, well, I was devastated. I was beyond worried about what I would do to pay for

my college education. For so long I had excelled and avoided failures but no I felt like this was

one of the lowest failures. I felt misunderstood by those around me and I couldn't understand

why this had affected me so much. I wanted to learn how to cope more healthily. Santor may

have not given me the answer I was looking for but the article she had written had given me a

sense of validation that how I react is reasonable.

My experience with failure has never been a straight path. It took me a long time to

understand that I was not coping or understanding myself in the way that I needed to be. I know

that I should always aim to get the prize or the 100% but it isn't always possible. I wanted to heal

the aspect of failures in academic institutions. I realized that my issue was not just with all

aspects of where failure falls but only specifically with education because I felt that this is the

one area of my life that I can succeed in. I knew I was weaker in different areas of success so

accepting failure in those was much easier. As Santor noted, there isn't a specific reason why this

is but what is critical to understand is healthy and unhealthy coping mechanisms that people use

and to understand that comes with the term failure that I could avoid instead. Overall, I am

grateful to have found Santor’s article as I now have a deeper understanding of how I think and

feel and know that my worth lies in many aspects, not just one.
 4

Works Cited

Santor, Darcy A., et al. “Coping with Failure.” Educational Review, vol. 72, no. 5, Sept. 2020,

pp. 635–49. EBSCOhost, https://doi.org/10.1080/00131911.2018.1524855.