Institutional Racism

students the opportunity to feel that their lives have meaning by working towards these
goals.
Purposeful life goals, such as work goals, may also increase students motivation to
learn. Adolescents may make connections between what they are learning in school
and how they will use those skills and knowledge will help them make an impact in the
future. This idea ultimately will lead students to create their own goals related to
mastering the material they are learning in school.
Adolescents who have goals, and believe that their opinions and voices can impact the
world positively, they may become more motivated. They become more committed to
mastering concepts and being accountable for their own learning, rather than focusing
on getting the highest grade in the class. Students will study more intently and deeply,
as well as persist longer, seeking out more challenges. They will like learning more
because the tasks they are doing have purpose, creating a personal meaning to them
and in turn leading to satisfaction.
Mindset
Students’ mindsets (how they perceive their abilities) play a large role in their
achievement and also their motivation. An adolescent's level of self-efficacy is a great
predictor of their level of academic performance, going above and beyond a student's
measured level of ability and also their prior performance in school. Students having a
growth mindset believe that their intelligence can be developed over time. Those with a
fixed mindset believe that their intelligence is fixed and cannot grow and develop.
Students with growth mindsets tend to outperform their peers who have fixed mindsets.
Students are highly influenced by their teachers in which kind of mindset they develop in
school. When people are taught with a growth mindset, the ideas of challenging
themselves and putting in more effort follow. People believe that each mindset is better
than the other, which causes students to feel that they are not as good as other
students in school. A big question that is asked in schooling is when does someone feel
smart: when they are flawless or when they are learning? With a fixed mindset, you
must be flawless, and not just smart in the classroom. With this mindset, there is even
more pressure on students to not only succeed, but to be flawless in front of their peers.
Students who have a fixed mindset, have come to change the idea of failure as an
action to an identity. They come to think of the idea of failing something as being that
they are a failure and that they cannot achieve something. This links back into how they
think of themselves as a person and decreases their motivation in school. This sense of
"failure" is especially prominent during adolescence. If one thing goes wrong, one with a
fixed mindset will feel that they cannot overcome this small failure, and thus their
mindset motivation will decrease.
Education Debt
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