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TEACHING TIPS Shifting Student Mindset from Fixed to Growth One struggle I have experienced is working with students who, like me, are perfectionists. A point of dissonance I have is that unless something is absolutely perfect, I rarely give 100% on student assignments. I have had several students who have wanted to have additional conversations with me in order to understand why they did not get full credit for an assignment in which they met the criteria, but did not receive all possible points. I have had to explain to them that meeting the criteria does not necessarily mean that there is nothing that could have been improved or no other ideas that could have been explored or further expanded upon. I find myself telling a student that getting 96%, in my mind, is still an A and will not affect their grade point average. I find myself inviting them into conversations on what for them is the qualitative difference between a 96 and a 100, for example. Why are those four points so important? My philosophy of teaching is that there is Elizabeth Banks, PhD Adjunct Faculty, Department of Psychology always something more that can be learned or understood in a different way, and perfection is not only usually impossible but maybe even not desirable. Virginia Satir spoke about humans always being in a condition of becoming and growing, and in congruence with that, I rarely see student work that could not be better, that could not benefit from continued growth and learning, whether that be in structure, style, or format. In addition, I think as burgeoning MFTs, my hope is that students would be less concerned with perfect grades and more concerned with process and growth. I worry that if students are concerned with perfection rather than growth and learning, they will lose sight of the ultimate goal, which is to become competent clinicians, and perhaps scholars and researchers, which in my mind does not hinge on a four-point grade differential. I find it interesting that I only seem to encounter this phenomenon with students who are used to high academic achievement. I see it as part of my job to help them understand that it is more important that they learn and understand the material than make a perfect grade.