Objective Proficiency p 79. I'm proof that academic failure can be good for you. Extra Reading

By Henry Porter
Read the article on the Guardian website

The picture of a 12-year-old boy jumping for joy last week after receiving an A grade for maths AS level and being declared the youngest person ever to pass the exam gave me little pleasure. This time of year reminds me of my mostly useless performance in examinations, particularly at maths. If it had been up to the bloodless young man who tried to drill me in what was then called the school maths project, or new maths, I would still be doing my annual resit of maths O-level.
My marks got worse every year until eventually I slipped off the scale and was not even accorded a grade nine (six was the pass). At that point, I left school.
So this column is dedicated to all the students who have done poorly and who now skulk in their bedrooms feeling the weight of failure and humiliation. Without wanting to wipe the bloom off the results of the star pupils, it is also a warning that a string of grade As carries you just so far in life; nobody will care about your triumph in a few years' time. What will count from the moment your education ends are energy, charm, curiosity, persistence, finishing strongly and your willingness to defy orthodoxy.
Energy is the greatest of these but getting used to disappointment is important, too. It builds another muscle. If you arrive in your first job with the applause of your teachers still ringing in your ears, never having suffered the slightest failure or having had to build the defences against rejection that we tail-end Charlies were privileged to acquire early on, then you are in for a great shock.
The hidden delight in life is that not all tomatoes ripen at the same time. Those that ripen early often go on to do great things but an equal number end up puzzled by their inability to get to grips with a world that is not invigilated by an examinations board looking for quotas of conventional knowledge. For those who develop later, in their twenties, thirties and perhaps forties, life can be remarkably rewarding. As they feel the powers and confidence grow, they will see the morning glories of their school days fade.
In my experience, the satisfaction is never ending, if only because the sense of failure heaped on young people during their education can be so damned painful. Two fingers raised to the ghosts of the men who looked down at the 14-year-old me with that mixture of despair, fatigue and pity is, I am ashamed to say, still my occasional pleasure.
Actually, among the Gradgrinds and Pecksniffs of my school years, there were two inspiring men who taught me history and English literature. As a result, I got a decent history A-level and just about passed English.
I also had a surprise success in my geography O-level, which taught me another lesson: luck sometimes counts for more in life than preparation. In those days, we were expected to interpret a slice of an ordnance survey map and explain the various features shown.
I opened the paper, unfolded the map and, to my astonishment, saw the village where I lived. I knew every feature intimately - the meandering course of the Avon, the flood-control measures, the lock, levees, the deciduous woods and the church with the Norman-style tower. I passed and with quite a respectable grade.
Dr Anthony Seldon, the new headmaster of Wellington, where I spent five years in a sort of long daydream, has now decided that students should be taught how to be happy using the methods of positive psychology. 'I have seen far too many tortured and unhappy pupils,' he wrote, 'who have achieved four or five A grades at A-level. If they can achieve these grades while leading balanced lives - and if they blossom as human beings, then all is well and good. But as any teacher will know, this isn't always the case with high achievers. Neither is it with high achievers in life. These driven people see their lives flash by in fast living and fast cars and most fail to realise they are missing the point of life.'
To add 'happiness skills' to a student's portfolio is certainly a good idea, and if Dr Seldon plans to deploy cognitive therapy, to my mind one of the great discoveries of the past few decades, even better. To teach people how to perceive their place in the world and not to view life as a series of threats and challenges to the ego should be more and more of a priority.
I would add another skill, summarised in a quote from Andre Gide, which I found while idling in a second-hand bookshop. 'You who will come when I have ceased to hear the noises of this earth and to taste its dew upon my lips, it is for you I write these pages; for perhaps you are not sufficiently amazed at being alive; you do not wonder as you should at this astounding miracle of your life.'
Beats a grade A in maths.

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