Grades that you lose sleep over

Grades are an interesting part of coursework. They're used to "evaluate" how effectively a student demonstrates learning, and each professor develops their own verbage to talk about what "counts" as an A or what "counts" as a B. Example:

• "A work is excellent and goes beyond what is required in terms of thinking and insight into the material."
• "B is an honor grade, awarded for work that is thoughtful and well-written, and demonstrates a good understanding of the material."

So what's the point of this? I got a B on my first writing assignment this semester. Graduate students are particularly funny about receiving grades. Somehow a B, that is supposedly an honor grade, makes my heart sink (and I know it has done the same to other grad students, too). What did I do wrong and how can I do better next time? Well, the written comments say I didn't "engage" with the reading enough. While completing this assignment, I was concerned that I wasn't including enough content from the readings, but this particular prompt asked us to really consider our audience (which was assigned to us as incoming graduate students) and I justified the amount of the course readings I included in those terms. Apparently my professor thinks I "dumbed the subject down" too much. That's my interpretation of his comments, by the way.

All in all, I'm discovering that the hardest graders are the ones not in the graduate program I'm enrolled in. In order to teach next semester, I've been required to take two courses outside of the regular coursework I'm doing. Although I'm familiar with the discipline these two other courses are in, the fact that I struggle the most in pleasing these professors is disconcerting to me. Ultimately, I'd like to earn a position at a university to work in this discipline, and here I am earning a B.

Luckily, I have a whole semester ahead of me to try to figure this professor out, but it's become evident that it won't be easy going. Maybe this will be the class I take the most out of simply because of how much it will evidently challenge me. (Although, I have earned any grades in one of my other courses yet. Maybe that one will end up being the toughest of them all).

Confident or Overconfident?

Been a long time, too long perhaps, but I survived my first semester as a Ph.D. student and am entering into my second. Lately, the idea of "success" as a student and in the academic career that will (hopefully) follow has been weighing heavily on my mind. It just so happens to be aligned nicely (or perhaps frightfully) with an article in The Chronicle of Higher Education on job prospects for Ph.D.s (The Odds Are Never In Your Favor). 

For the most part, since I've decided to go down the path of pursuing a Ph.D. I've been confident that I would succeed. This may be in part due to the professors in my master's program encouraging me down this path, suggesting that I would be brilliant and fully capable of success, but it's also knowing that I've made it this far already. Don't get me wrong, there are plenty aspects of this road I'm travelling that frighten me. Comprehensive exams, getting published, dissertation, finding funding for travel to conferences, entering the job market and totally relocating yet again. Despite all of that, I still think of it as taking just one step at a time and that it is all conquerable. However, is that outlook detrimental?

I'm not naive enough to think that I won't question it or that I won't want to give up, but maybe this confidence I have can do more harm than good. Maybe when it comes time for me to face this giant hurdles I will not face them with the caution that I should, and I will find myself pushed to the brink wondering what will happen to me if I break. Along the same token, I think too much caution, too much fear, of what lies ahead is dangerous. If I constantly fear the unknown and what has yet to come, how can I ever make the bold choices that I may need to make?

Maybe it's not an issue of confidence after all and it's just a matter of having a positive outlook on life. Thinking that I'm here for a purpose, even if I don't know what that purpose is, and the only possible way forward is for me to succeed.