Many of my blogs are related to the undergraduate thesis program in the school where I teach. Maybe because this is the time when the students become more serious, when they show forth the result of their five years of stay in the university. Maybe because there are so many lessons to learn on how they deal with the challenge of a thesis. It seems like the best opportunity to evaluate one has learned so far in the academe and in real life. The greatest lesson to learn just recently is related to the virtue of perseverance, and has a lot to do with the virtue of humility.
The thesis coordinators set January 23 as the deadline for thesis materials. The deadline is quite early this school year because they wanted to accommodate the sheer number of students expected to defend their theses. Unfortunately, the deadline fell on the midterm exams week. This doubled the pressure on those students. The reactions were predictable. Most of them backed out.
On the day for the submission, the coordinators decided to return the drawings after checking them and assigning dates for thesis defense. Since there are fewer students defending their theses, the start of defense was moved up by two weeks. Technically this means that there are still two more weeks to continue working on the drawings! Not only that, the coordinators accepted everyone's drawings except for one. Yet, many of those accepted were actually incomplete.
I am sure that most of those who backed out regretted their decisions. It must have pained them to realize that what they feared they can not achieve is actually doable. When I learned that some of my friends were backing out I tried to reason with them. Generally I discouraged them from doing so... but no one listens.
I have learned in the past how narrow minded one can get by simply obeying laws to the letter. I believe more on obeying laws to its "spirit". Back in college, I missed out a departmental exam in Design (a simulation of the board exams for architects) simply because I forgot to bring my admissions slip. Since the rule says no exam for those without admissions slip, then I simply went home. The rest who were in similar situation, however, remained and requested for a special consideration. After all, the ruling was meant to ensure that the students have paid their tuition fees, which they did except that they left the proof at home. In the end, they were allowed to take the exam with the condition that they present the proof the following day, otherwise their exam is forfeited.
I told the students who decided to back out to simply hang on. It is true that they were told to submit the drawings and models which should be 90% complete but I also told them that those who made the rules, and are enforcing them, are human beings. There is a chance, no matter how slight, that they would reconsider. The students simply need to give that opportunity for the coordinators to reconsider. This is the perseverance part.
The humility part has to do with rejection. I told the students to work on the bare minimum requirements and submit them, and take their chance. If accepted, they should be grateful, but if rejected, then they simply accept the fact (they were backing out anyway). The reply of some students to this advice was a bit irritating. They say they can not handle rejection. They would rather back out now than feel the humiliation of getting rejected. Fine! Right now I imagine them drowning their sorrow, along with their pride, with a lot of beer.
I don't know if this is appropriate, but I learned a great lesson from my spiritual director about perseverance and humility in the interior struggle, and I found these lessons very much applicable to virtually anything we do. If we accept our limit, our weakness, and we accept the fact that we can not do everything alone, then we become powerful. This is because our friends and family will fill in our weaknesses with their strengths, and together that bond creates a strong spirit within us.
"frater qui adiuvatur a fratre quasi civitas firma..." (A brother that is helped by his brother, is like a strong city) - Proverbs 18:19
