With school back in session, many young persons find themselves back in (therapy) sessions, sessions which all seem to echo sentiments of a palpable truth–our culture places more value on image than it does wellbeing.

A host of factors can be blamed for the messaging that youth receive at an increasingly young age (a message that says your worth is tied to how others perceive you, therefore you have to be carefully curating everything about yourself).

Everything from social media to the emphasis on college admissions to the grading system itself contribute to this problem. It can leave parents of school aged children feeling powerless to help their chronically sleep-deprived and stressed out teen, or motivate their seemingly insolent child to care about their school work. Moreover, well meaning parents might find themselves falling in step with this message by willing their child to achieve certain grades or participate in specific activities so they can make the arbitrary cut.

Schools tout efforts to focus on mental health and offer gestures such as homework free weekends; while these efforts can make a difference for some, they can also be futile for the majority when the underlying implication remains that results and accolades matter, and they matter a lot.

If you’re a parent of a school aged child and are concerned about the school year ahead and/or the wellbeing of your child overall, there are some key points below that can hopefully offer a perspective shift to help both you and your child.

Rejecting the competition culture means acknowledging to your child that there may always be a metric comparing them against others their age, but their ranking in that competition is wholly unrelated to their intrinsic worth. That’s not to say there can’t be value in competition, but it’s up to the adult to monitor and model for a child the difference between healthy motivation and unrealistic expectations. Rejecting the culture means actively talking to kids about how the society we live in may place a lot of emphasis on where you go to college or simply that you go to college, but that as a parent you place value on the bigger picture that gets lost in this narrow focus–you value your child finding a fulfilling path and a life that aligns with their values, goals, and beliefs. This might be explicitly communicated with your child, but it will be indirectly communicated through comments and reactions to all things on the topic of school, grades, and post-grad.

For adolescents starting to think about post-grad, it could be beneficial to bring up the differences in other countries compared to the U.S., like how in Europe it’s common to take a gap year or even several instead of going straight into more school after secondary school. Openly talking about options that aren’t just academia for post-grad, such as apprenticeships, volunteering abroad, two year colleges, etc., removes the stigma of not being conventionally college bound, or at least not being college bound immediately after high school. When a student can have these alternatives in mind, it can ease a tremendous amount of pressure and effectively help their school performance.

The idea of rejecting the culture does not mean you are telling your child (or wanting your child) to not care about school and post-grad. It means you are empowering them with an alternative way to view school, a way that puts less emphasis on the report card and more emphasis on the experience of being a student.

If you find it hard to delineate which is which, you might want to talk it out with school staff, other professionals, your spouse, or someone you feel comfortable with. Above all, listen to your intuition and give yourself the chance to answer this question honestly–is this coming from my own discomfort or anxiety about seeing my child struggle/fail, or is there a true need to step in? If it’s the former, take this as information and find outlets, coping, and support for yourself. Helping yourself will always help your child!

Go to the worst case scenario mentally and work backwards–if the worst case is they don’t get into this school, they’ll be bummed for a bit but they’ll move on and end up somewhere else. Or maybe they will find an alternative path that doesn’t involve a four year college. And maybe that’s ok. Then from there you might go to a less negative scenario, which is dropping the level (from let’s say honors to CP) doesn’t actually affect their chance of admissions to this school. From there you might switch to the benefits of this occurring, like your child being able to keep up with the material better and developing a greater sense of competence.

When you are able to notice and challenge catastrophizing in yourself, it’s easier to recognize and understand when your child is doing it and help them gain perspective. It starts with acknowledging how even in the worst case scenario the world will not end, and from there challenging the likelihood of this one situation leading to the worst case in the first place. The mind will waste great energy asking “what if I fail” but it can break out of this headspace if it asks “what if it all works out?”

Redefining success means identifying what is being gained in the process of working towards the grade, regardless of what the grade ends up being. The same can be said for working towards a new skill, taking a risk, and undergoing the college application process. It might seem like a runaway horse with the message from peers, teachers, and even school counselors being that grades matter and are the single most important way a student’s success is being measured. AP classes after all are often taken for the sole purpose of gaining college credit by doing well on the exam at the end of the course, which negates the fact that there is opportunity in taking the course to be challenged and learn in-depth about a subject of interest, regardless of the outcome of the test at the end.

With the multitude of influences saying success is strictly measured by results, parents must counteract the constant emphasis on class selection and grades by practicing neutrality towards these measures. It can feed the beast just as much to over-hype an A as it does to frown upon a C. One way to practice shifting the focus from outcomes (grades, scores, ranking) to process (the learning experience, working on assignments, putting in time and effort) is by inquiring about the content of the classes.