Is the blame yours?

So, you failed the MBLEx, perhaps more than once.  You have most likely experienced a multitude of emotions: shame, embarrassment, quilt, frustration, sadness, even anger.  While most of those emotions were likely aimed at yourself, a portion of them may have been aimed at your school.  Is it a justified reaction to feel anger or frustration at the school you attended because you failed the MBLEx?  Perhaps.

               While the ultimate responsibility for how we do in any endeavor is our own, the quality of education and preparation a massage school provides its students is certainly a factor in the student’s ability to pass the MBLEx.  I recently had a student who went through a four-month program with much of the information being mainly self-study.  It is not even remotely realistic to expect students to learn the information covered on the MBLEx in a four-month time period.  While this example may be on the extreme margin when discussing massage school curricula, it is still an example of some of the problems within the massage school “system.”

               Having taught at a massage school for 16 years and having tutored hundreds of students in MBLEx prep over the past 4 years, I feel qualified to give an opinion on the subject.  Many of these students have related their experiences regarding their education at their respective schools and while some seemed to receive an excellent education many others received what could only be referred to as a lack luster education.  It sometimes seems that the quality of education many of the massage school students are receiving does not compare to the level of information that is being demanded of them when they attempt the MBLEx.  Curriculums that move to quickly or are far to brief, instructors that are not truly qualified to teach the subject, grades that are handed out more by rote and less by actual achievement giving students a false sense of their understanding of the material, a lack of instruction on the fundamentals of anatomy, all of these are issues that come up with students I tutor.  There is definitely a problem with many massage school programs out there.

               So, are the schools to blame for your inability to pass the MBLEx?  While part of the answer is yes, the more immediate answer is, it is a waste of energy and time to look for blame.  The bottom line is that you have completed the school part and now you need to pass the MBLEx.  If your education/learning of the material was less than stellar due to a lack luster program and/or because of lack luster studying on your part is mostly irrelevant at this point.  The best thing you can do now is to take a hard honest look at how much you truly understand the material necessary to pass the MBLEx.  After this tough self-evaluation, you now need to take a realistic approach to mastering this material before sitting for the test again.  If an honest evaluation tells you need at least 6 months of hard studying (or perhaps more) than that is what you need to do, regardless of your desire to get the test over with quickly.

               So, stop the blame game and get to work.  You can do this if you put in the honest hard work to make it happen.