How to Promote Grit and Resilience in Young Learners

How Grit is a Positive Predictor of Academic Success among College Students

Introduction

College can be a trying time for students due to the weight of new responsibilities and the increase in personal accountability. There are no parents looming over one’s shoulder, the subjects and classes are more difficult and require more study, and the pressures can build. One quality of successful students that has been identified by researchers is grit—a toughness of character that helps a person to be resilient when facing obstacles so as to overcome them (Crede, 2018). This paper will conduct a literature review of the relevant material related to grit as a positive predictor of academic successful among the college student population. It will look at both qualitative and quantitative findings. It will also identify a need for an intervention at the macro level and explain why this population is in need of a targeted intervention based on the literature reviewed. Finally, it will make a recommendation of a specific intervention related to the concept of grit and describe how this intervention could be carried out and evaluated.

Literature Review

Crede (2018) argues that the evidence is lacking to support grit as an effective predictor of academic success or that long-term goals will be reached. The argument is based on Crede’s (2018) evaluation of the definition of grit as perseverance plus passion. Because grit is a construct, however, the defining of it will vary from one study to another. Crede (2018) states that the evidence does not support the view that grit is necessary for success, and part of his problem is with the construct itself. Grit is defined by Crede (2018) by two other constructs (passion and perseverance) which makes it impossible to really understand at a scientific level. With that said, Crede’s qualitative assessment of the evidence ignores the quantitative findings of other researchers and cherry-picks data so as to present grit in a negative light when it comes to predicting academic success. One interesting finding from Crede’s (2018) assessment is that if interventions at developing perseverance in a student are to be successful they must be long-term. In other words, one cannot expect a brief intervention to be effective at addressing a problem that affects students at the college level. Grit is something that has to be developed at a younger age and honed as the student grows older. Attempting to instill the values that make up grit in the personality and character at the age of 18 is too late; the character has already been formed. For an intervention to last and be effective, it must be implemented much earlier—well before the students reach the college level stage of life.

The quantitative data supports the notion that grit can predict academic success. Unlike Crede (2018), Boerma and Neill (2020) define grit as a “facet” of perseverance, which means it is a quality of that virtue—akin to tenaciousness (p. 442). They found that university students who possessed that facet of perseverance tended to score higher GPAs. Thus, the quantitative data indicates in this study that grit is a good predictor of academic success.

The study by Boerma and Neill (2020) is not alone. Hodge, Wright and Bennett (2018) also found that the grit factor made a difference in the academic performance of the 395 university students in their study’s sample. The researchers found a “positive relationship between grit, engagement and academic productivity” (p. 448). Wolters and Hussain (2015) also found that grit was a good predictor of university students’ ability to engage in self-regulated learning. The same is true of the study by Fong and Kim (2019), which showed that grit is a positive predictor of university students’ GPA. Their study is supported by Vela, Lu, Lenz, and Hinojosa (2015) who noted that familial support systems also serve as a good predictor. Additionally, Strayhorn (2014) showed that grit is a determining predictor for African-American university students as well. And in online education, self-regulation is needed by students to stay engaged and grit factors into their performance there, too, according to the quantitative study by Buzzetto-Hollywood, Quinn, Wang and Hill (2019). All these quantitative studies show that grit is a good predictor of academic performance. The qualitative quibbling of Crede (2018) does not suffice to discourage these researchers’ interpretation of the data.

However, Crede (2018) does make a valid point about the need for a long-term intervention to develop grit. The quantitative studies focus on the predictive power of grit. They do not focus on how to develop Grit. In his qualitative analysis, Crede (2018) shows that grit cannot be developed via a short-term intervention once the student has reached the college age. In other words, it must be developed at a younger age so that it becomes a life-long habit, i.e., the virtue of perseverance. That insight from Crede (2018) can be useful when developing an intervention. Since the quantitative data shows how important grit is in the academic success of college students, it is clear that an intervention to address the lack of collegiate success should focus on grit. The study Vela et al. (2015) also highlighted the role that family support plays, so that is another factor to consider for the intervention. However, as Crede (2018) points out, the intervention has to start earlier, before the students are at the college age and ideally when they are still in primary school so that a solid foundation for grit can be developed fully.

Intervention

College students should have an adequate amount of grit by the time they reach that level of academics because of the nature of the work that they will be facing. Secondary education is challenging itself, but students often have the full-support of teachers and family along with tutoring services while in secondary school. In college, they are typically more independent and thus have to rely on themselves to succeed. If they lack the ability to persevere by not having enough grit in their characters, the research shows their grades will suffer and they will not have as high a GPA as other students who have developed grit. If grades suffer, students can become discouraged, which can lead to a higher dropout rate. At the macro level, there is a need to instill grit in these students. But how? As Crede (2018) explains, an intervention of this nature must be long-term. That means even if the intervention were initiated for freshman university students, it would likely have to be an intervention that lasts the duration of their undergraduate lives.

The college student population is vulnerable to a number of pressures and obstacles. They typically take out expensive loans to pay for expensive classes, and if the return (good grades) is not evident, they can lose heart. The research shows that grit is vital to success (Boerma & Neill, 2020). It is evident, therefore, that an intervention is needed. There are two options for helping this vulnerable population. One option is to initiate an intervention to aid students in the development of grit at a younger age, starting in primary school and continuing through secondary school so that by the time the students are of college age they are ready to face the challenges there independently. Another option is to provide an intervention that lasts the duration of the college experience and that assists the population in developing grit over the course of their studies. This could be akin to an intervention in which a sort of family support system is provided on campus but that focuses the student on positive thinking and the encouragement of persevering against all odds in accordance with the findings of Vela et al. (2015).

Recommendation

Using a macro lens, the best recommendation is to combine the two options so that the intervention has the characteristic of a reformation. The focus would be on altering the educative approach from top to bottom so that students from elementary school through to college are given the support needed to help them become grittier students. This intervention could be carried out only with the support of the Department of Education and the united efforts of colleges across America. The main approach would be to promote students focusing on the task in front of them and not permitting a wandering attitude of the grass-is-always-greener-somewhere-else. By reinforcing the need to focus, students can develop grit at a young age. Second, it is important to give students a growth mindset that allows them to see their skills as something that they can develop. By empowering students to believe that they can be resilient enough to solve difficult problems on their own, by giving them the tools to use, and by giving them the time and encouragement to figure it out, schools can promote the development of the necessary grit.

This type of intervention would necessarily be an agency policy that is put forward by the Department of Education and that colleges also support on their campuses by having a Grit and Determination Office, where students can go for additional training and support. This can be an Office where positive thinking is promoted and resiliency made the core focus. Resiliency training is offered in the US Army even now because officers have seen that soldiers tend to lack grit and so when obstacles arise the officers need to focus soldiers on developing their resilience to obstacles so as to reduce the risk of depression. The Office would need a training staff that can assist learners in positivity thinking and show them how to identify their strengths and use those strengths to combat weaknesses and overcome obstacles. It would be similar to the way psychologists use cognitive behavioral therapy in helping clients to overcome negative triggers to pull them into harmful modes of thinking and acting.

This proposal is culturally sensitive to the needs of the population because it will also rely on what Velo et al. (2015) have described as the need to involve the family for additional support. In the younger years, the school system will use social media to connect with parents and guardians so as to encourage them to be active their children’s education by providing support at home and letting their children know that they can overcome the challenges and succeed. Not every learner comes from the same cultural background so the supportive use of media will be general in concept and not rely on tropes or memes that are white-centric.

Evaluating the Impact

One of the best ways to evaluate impact is to conduct a quantitative analysis of data collected from surveys and from looking at raw data such as student test scores and GPA averages. First, a baseline is needed. This would be a measure of GPA averages for a general sample of students in grades 5 through to college years. This would give the baseline for measuring whether there has been any improvement as a result of the intervention. The intervention has to be institutional and reformative in aspect, so this evaluation can be longitudinal, conducted year after year to see whether changes in the intervention approach are needed or if results are satisfactory. A percentage increase in test scores and GPA averages should be targeted at the end of the first year, second year, and so on.

Surveys of students, teachers and parents can also be conducted to see what the perspective of these stakeholders is on the development of grit and its utility in academic success at the college level. The college student is the population of ultimate focus, and it is this population that should ultimately attain the necessary level of grit. To that end, special focus of the intervention should be on the Office of Grit and Determination that colleges set up on campus to see how much activity they are getting from students, what those interactions are like, how effective training is being (again surveys will be useful here with trainers and trainees answering questions at the end of one training session), but the best measure will be the raw data of test scores and GPA averages.

Selecting a sample to measure is important because that sample should be reflective of the general population overall. That means the sample should not be all from one college where the demographics of the college do not resemble national demographics. Neither should the sample come from one region of the US only. The best kind of sample would be randomized and would be demographically representative of the college population as a whole.