Coasting: Stories about having it easy
The Story Collider
Story Collider, Inc.
4.4 • 824 Ratings
🗓️ 12 December 2025
⏱️ 26 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
In this week’s episode, both of our storytellers reckon with what happens when success doesn’t come so easily anymore.
Part 1: After years of academic achievement, newly minted professor Stephanie Rowley is caught off guard when every paper she submits is rejected.
Part 2: Growing up, Kate Schmidt always thought of herself as the “smart kid,” but that identity is shaken when she gets to university and receives her first C.
Stephanie J. Rowley is the William R. Kenan Jr. Professor of Education and dean of the School of Education and Human Development at the University of Virginia. Before returning to UVA, where she earned a Ph.D. in developmental psychology, she was provost and dean at Teachers College, Columbia University. Rowley has won numerous awards for her research, teaching, service, and mentorship. Among her most valued awards have been those received for her outstanding mentoring of students. She currently lives in Charlottesville, Virginia with her husband, Larry, whom she met when they were graduate students at UVA.
Kate Schmidt is an early childhood educator and planetarium pilot at the American Museum of Natural History who specializes in teaching 8 year olds astrophysics. She has worked in the museum field for over a decade, is on the board of the New York City Museum Educator Roundtable, and has finally figured out that her job is just: Museum. Outside of work, she is the host and producer of Astronomy on Tap and Biology on Tap - monthly events that bring scientists and the public together at the bar. Most importantly, Kate is a deeply unserious person who firmly believes in the power of whimsy. Oh, and her favorite planet is Jupiter.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | A science story, huh? |
| 0:04.0 | Is NYU a scientist the... |
| 0:06.0 | I felt right. |
| 0:08.0 | And I just thought, well... |
| 0:10.0 | It was that golden moment. |
| 0:12.0 | Because science was on my side. |
| 0:15.0 | Hey, if you're Hey everyone, welcome to the story clatter, where true personal stories about science help us discover |
| 0:29.2 | how weird and wonderful it is to exist in this world and be a human. I'm your host, Mishayevsky, |
| 0:33.9 | and today's stories are all about that humbling moment when you find out you're not a natural at something. We've all been there, where we're good at something and that all of a sudden, |
| 0:42.0 | we level up and make the shocking discovery that we're actually not hot shit? So fun. Our first story is |
| 0:48.0 | from the William R. Kenan Jr. Professor of Education and Dean of the School of Education and Human |
| 0:53.1 | Development at the University of |
| 0:54.5 | Virginia, Stephanie Roley. Her story was recorded at a special show we did at the University |
| 0:59.2 | of Virginia in Charlottesville earlier this year. Here's Stephanie. |
| 1:06.3 | In 1992, I was a doctoral student here at UVA, and I was in my very first doctoral course with Bennett |
| 1:20.6 | Bertenthal. The class was intro to cognitive psychology. And I love this class. And I have to say, I aced the first |
| 1:31.3 | exam. And that exam led to a great conversation with Bennett where he was just trying to get to |
| 1:38.4 | know me. And I was sharing with him how I ended up at UVA and some of the things that brought me here. |
| 1:47.0 | And I'll never forget, he said in that conversation, you know, Stephanie, you've lived a charmed |
| 1:53.2 | life. And I thought, what does that mean exactly? Even now, I think back to this so often. And I think that what he was referring to, |
| 2:03.7 | given the context, was really that I had been very successful in my applications to graduate |
| 2:09.8 | schools and getting fellowships and just lots of opportunities that were open to me. And so I could kind of see his point that I had been |
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