Q1

Academic pressure refers to the expectation of achieving high grades and the stress that comes with it. The pressure can come from within oneself or from external sources like family, peers, or the university. It is important for students to reflect on their own priorities and values to manage this pressure. Academic achievement is just one aspect of life, and there are other ways to find contentment. It is also important to remember that learning is a journey and that grades are not the only measure of success. Students should focus on the experience of learning rather than just the outcomes. Academic pressure can come from within and external sources, and it is important to prioritize personal values and interests. Grades do not define one's worth, and it is important to remember that there are different ways to demonstrate knowledge and understanding. So Claire, what does the term academic pressure mean to you and what might it look like? Academic pressure is the idea that you have to achieve and even overachieve in the academic realm and this is often linked to having to get certain grades and what it looks like is stress, which obviously can be visible or invisible. Academic pressure can come from within or it can come from without. So these ideas can come from yourself, from the university, from your wider environment, your peers, from family. So we often wonder with our students who come into the counselling room, where is this pressure coming from? Where is it? Is it from you or is it from somewhere else? If it's important to know when we're thinking about that, when we're thinking about pressure, about what our priorities are, what our values are. So that might link into the other podcast that we've had. So we often say to students, ask yourself, is academic achievement important to you intrinsically? Does it make you feel better? Does it make you feel that you can live a contented life? And are there other things that are also equally important? And that is a way that we sometimes work with students in terms of how to manage pressure. In terms of the numbers, we can often get lost in the outcomes and I think that in a way that's understandable, that we invite students to think about the learning journey and the experience of learning and a way to mitigate those pressures. Because it's not always about getting a first or an A star or a distinction, or there's no points. Well, there's every point, isn't there? Because particularly if you value the journey. Other grades are still good grades. And for example, having a first is not the minimum grade to actually get a degree. You can get an ordinary degree. So that just helps us remember that there's a whole ladder, there's a spectrum. And then again, we pose questions to students, you know, is getting that grade really, really important to you? And if so, why? Or is it more about what other people have told you? Can you do what you want to do? Can you do your next step with a different grade? And invariably people can. So I think in terms of pressure, what it means to us as counsellors is that we understand it. We know that it exists. It's not like we're immune to it ourselves. But it's worth noting there's lots of different ways to get to where we want in life and lots of different routes to contentment. And academic achievement is only one of them. Absolutely. And I'd say sort of, you know, that idea of where it comes from, it's really mindful, you know, helps to be mindful that we're in this institution and that there can be, it can feel like there's one pathway, there's one way of kind of performing, there's one thing that's acceptable, but there's a whole massive world sort of out there in different approaches and different ways. And so, you know, as Claire was saying about connecting with what's important to you, that's kind of really important because it might not actually be the same as what the messages and the environment around you. And that can have a kind of real impact on you if you're trying to sit with your own values in the context of perhaps different values. So yeah, these are really helpful things to reflect on. And as, you know, Claire said about learning, it's important that, you know, we kind of feel often that we need to know everything, that we've got to know absolutely everything that's going on, that, okay, I've got every single content of this entire subject I've got to be able to do for this exam. You know, this is a learning experience. If you knew everything when you started, you wouldn't even know what it is. That wouldn't need to go to uni. Exactly, exactly. But there's this feeling that I've got to know it now, like I ought to already know all of it. It would make everything redundant if that were the case. So it's kind of reminding yourself that that is really important, you know, that it is, as Claire said, it's a journey. It's about that kind of learning experience. It's also worth remembering that all those people that you're looking up to, those sort of academics, have been there too. They've had to learn too. And no one was born having all this information. So it's a really kind of important thing to ground yourself in that as well. And also remembering, you know, as Claire was saying about the sort of range of grades, that actually a pass mark is generally not 100% in a lot of cases. That sense of having to know everything, I've got to get everything right. Well, actually, if they're saying that, you know, getting 60% is enough to get a degree, then you don't actually have to know everything because it's not 100%, you know. So reminding yourself of those sorts of things too. And I just wanted to add, I think it's really important to reflect on the fact that sometimes the academics that you might be seeing, as you say, Ray, they have already been there. But also, they might not know the answers necessarily themselves. So when we're thinking about pressure, it can affect everybody or anybody. And we reflected in the previous episode about self-efficacy and academic courage of learning to sit comfortably and learn, not knowing. Rather than feeling like you have to, for example, memorise a script for a lecture or something, actually, we probably know more than we think we do. But also, if students ask questions, we can go away and find out. And that's part of a journey in terms of knowledge building in itself. Absolutely. That's really powerful as well. I know certainly when I've experienced people and I don't go, I don't know, I need to check that or I need to, you know, because that's actually acknowledging there is a limit to all the knowledge that we can have and that we know and actually that curiosity that, oh, that's a really good question. I don't know the answer to that. I'm going to go away and look that up because I'm interested. I care. And there's so many qualities in that that are a real value, you know, that aren't just, oh, I happen to know the answer. But actually, oh, okay, I'm now thinking. And that curiosity and thinking, I mean, that's brilliant. That's part of that sort of academic world as well. So yeah, definitely. And with some of the students that you've worked with at the University Chancellor's Service, what are some of the, I guess, common sources of pressure that, academic pressure that you've seen that students have kind of, you know, talked about? I mean, yes. I was thinking, perhaps you were thinking this as well, Ray, that a lot of the pressure comes from within. And there'll be a variety of reasons why that is the case. It might be, perhaps, just someone's natural inclination. It might be that they've grown up in a peer or family environment where there is a lot of onus on certain kinds of achievement, and academic achievement being a visible one. Why the social pressure, perhaps? And then, of course, the environmental pressure of being at a university and a university that's got, you know, a very high standard of learning and teaching and education all adds to it. And I think there's kind of a snowball effect to that. Completely, yeah. And a lot of the, you know, within things, sometimes people's identities and sense of self kind of has been that academic thing. They might have been the academic one in the family. They might have been the top in their class. And they come to Cambridge and, you know, suddenly everyone else is like that. And that's a difficult, you know, so then there's that kind of pressure of now I've got to keep performing because it's who I am, but in an environment where everyone else is doing that. And yeah, it's a snowball effect. It's everywhere. It feels like the message is, you know, you can't go away from that. Yeah. And I guess when you're a student, that is kind of your identity. That's kind of how you, when people ask what you're doing, you say, oh, I'm a student. And so, yes, you want to do your best at that. Yeah. I guess. So the, I guess, external factors and internal factors, they're kind of like intrinsically linked and they just kind of work and impact each other. Absolutely. Yeah. And with that kind of defining yourself, there's also can be an idea that you're defined by your grades as well. So the idea that, you know, you have to do certain, get a certain grade in order to have worth or to have any sort of value. So knowing that you're more than your grades. So, you know, given lots of questions, you know, what's important to you, but also what are your other interests? Who are you aside from those grades? Because that can really feel like, oh, this is all who I am and everything. There's also with exams in particular, being aware that different modes of assessment, you know, different people, you know, suit certain modes of assessments. So if we think all our grades are, the sense of self is defined by our grades, which is defined by one exam. Well, A, that day could just be all sorts of things, you know, that one particular day might be a good day, might be a bad day, but also, you know, explaining your knowledge or your understanding through a written paper in a certain format might not be the best way for you to express that knowledge and that understanding. So being really mindful, it's a snapshot, it doesn't define you. And particularly within the section there with neurodiversity and things like that as well, in terms of just different ways of communicating, you know, what we understand works for different people. And that's okay. But also then if we've got our self worth wrapped up in a particular grade, that can feel really difficult if that particular assessment mode is not the one that we kind of resonate with most. Yeah, I can agree with you more because my struggle has always been writing concisely. And every teacher has always said to me, what you're writing is, you write well and, you know, you write beautifully, but you're not answering the question because, you know, I just struggled writing concisely. So for me, essays was always the struggle for me, whereas exams where it's just, you know, writing, you get a question, you write an answer and, you know, multiple choice, whatever, that was always what I excelled in because yeah, essays was just really difficult for me. Yeah, so I can agree with you more. Yeah, so it's really important just to, you know, be kind to yourself, you know, understand these are the frameworks that you must go, okay, these are the ways in which we're going to assess it, but they're not absolute truth. Yeah, we get kind of caught up in this absoluteness about them.