All our lives, our parents and teachers taught us how to prepare ourselves to be successful. A recent Associated Press article however, tells us that we may need to think otherwise.

Washington and Lee University in Virginia invited ex-New York Times reporter Jayson Blair to a journalism conference there late last week to talk about---oh, the irony---ethics. The article reports that having such events as this could possibly shed some light onto the value of exposing students to failure and preparing them to know what to do in case it happens.

Some people publicly fail like Blair, the article reported. Most of us though, when we fail it’s a more personal struggle. For instance, some fall short in their careers, others their personal relationships. The article brought up a great point though---in college and even high school, every speaker we had was good at something, the high rollers of politics, writing, business, you name it. Basically their purpose was to let us all know our education that cost thousands of dollars will be worth the price in a few years.

Also, our generation is apparently fascinated with failure. Our moms and dads have protected us from failing so many times (come on, I bet a good amount of you still have trophies from just being on a team, not even really succeeding) that it makes the thought of failing completely horrifying, the article said.

The author of the book “Education’s End: Why Our Colleges and Universities Have Given Up on the Meaning of Life” said in the article that even the most intelligent, successful students at Yale University are usually affected most by flawed characters in their readings. For example, Thucydidies “History of the Pelopennesian War,” students are more interested in Alcibiades, the politician who made too many enemies and misused his talents than the heroes, the article reported.

Students are somewhat introduced to failure, even though the majority seem like they are not. The concept of service-learning is growing on campuses, the article said. Father Edward Malloy of Notre Dame teaches a class for students who wish to hear firsthand accounts of homeless people, allowing students a personal look into failure.

Our take:

I think we all deserve to be introduced to a little bit of failure. I can’t tell you how much failure scares the pants off me, and I don’t even think my parents protected me from it as much as some do today. It is vitally important for students to be exposed to such things in order to make them a more well-rounded individual when they enter the workforce.