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Bite-sized stories of failure and success. Failure bites. It’s painful, discouraging and embarrassing. Just the idea of failure, whether it’s a big messy fail or a small setback, can be hard to digest. It’s time to change the way we think about failure. Yes, failure may be all of those negative things, but failure is also a very important part of learning and growing. Behind every great success story is a long series of failures and challenges that were also learning experiences. Join host Dr. Kristin Brynteson as she talks with successful people about failure, growth and success to inspire you and take the bite out of failure.

Failure Bites - Dr. Marlo Barnett - "The Bigger the Goal, the Bigger the Challenges"

S01E02: The Bigger the Goal, the Bigger the Challenges – Dr. Marlo Barnett

Host Kristin Brynteson talks to Dr. Marlo Barnett about the struggles of crossing the finish line of achieving a PhD.

Follow Dr. Barnett on Twitter: twitter.com/marlobarnett

Follow NIU STEAM on Twitter: twitter.com/niusteam

Facebook: www.facebook.com/NIUSTEAM/

KB: You are listening to the Failure Bites podcast, where successful people tell bite-size stories of failure, growth, and success. I'm your host, Kristin Brynteson. Big goals can be scary. Not only are they big, but there can also be roadblocks and obstacles around every corner, ready to overwhelm us and prevent us from achieving our goal. In this episode, we hear from Dr. Marlo Barnett, a graduate from Northern Illinois University with a PhD in Educational Technology. Dr. Barnett currently works for Chicago Public Schools as a K-8 technology teacher and an advocate for equity and diversity in computer science. She shares her tale of how she looked a big goal in the eye and didn't back down until she achieved it.

MB: I am a graduate of Northern Illinois University, class of 2017 and 2012. So, a time when I faced a challenge or a particular failure, since I am a recent graduate still, I am going to talk about the challenge of actually… successfully defending my dissertation.

If you are a PhD student or in a doctoral program, you know that the challenges that exist with that, and one of the challenges, I'm just going to say right out was with my writing. I... my writing has always not been academically the best, so I have had to reach out to the writing center, and I also had to acquire getting a professional editor. So, I can remember all of the rewrites and rewrites and rewrites and then I had a graduation date and time all planned and I couldn’t graduate on time and it was because there were other challenges, but, it mainly... it was writing.

So, to overcome that I, like I said, I went to… got professional help for my writing and also I got a professional editor and as a result of all of the rewrites and all of the challenges that come with the dissertation, I successfully defended my dissertation and graduated, and I’m here to tell the story.

KB: You just heard Dr. Marlo Barnett talk about how she overcame challenges to achieve her big PhD goal. Being honest with ourselves about our strengths and our weaknesses is an essential step in achieving our goals. As we heard from Dr. Barnett, admitting that writing might be a roadblock for her and utilizing her resources helped her attain her goal of getting a PhD. When we are aware of our weaknesses, we can make a plan for how to overcome them and not let our short falls get in the way of reaching our goals. I’m Kristin Brynteson, and this was Failure Bites. Leave a review and subscribe for more stories of successful people and the failures that got them there. This podcast was produced by NIU STEAM at Northern Illinois University. Your future, our focus.

www.niu.edu/niusteam

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