“Failure is Scary”: An Exploratory Case Study of How Preservice Teachers Identify and Process Failures

Failure learning remains an unexplored and even avoided topic within teacher education, particularly in School-Based Agricultural Education (SBAE), despite recognized benefits from failure. To effectively incorporate failure learning, we must revisit the preservice teacher experience, showing how they approach and handle failure so we may better inform teacher preparation programs and their educators. Our qualitative exploratory case study did this as we explored how preservice teachers identify and process failure in an SBAE teacher preparation program at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. This research study seeks to bridge the theoretical and practical gaps in preparing preservice teachers to effectively recognize, reflect on, reconcile with, and grow from failure by engaging with 47 SBAE preservice teachers. We collected data through observations, text-based interviews, and reflection prompts.