With just fewer than 15 million views, psychologist Angela Duckworth’s TED talk ‘Grit: The power of passion and perseverance,’ carved an idea into each viewer’s brain: hard work leads to achievement more than luck, talent or good fortune.
The key to success, however, is not spurts of motivation from time to time. Instead, Duckworth found accomplishments come from consistent hard work. In order to establish this rhythm, junior Caleb Dunafon started his path to prosperity early.
Dunafon grew older and began to stand out from the rest of his peers. Unlike other children his age who imagined becoming doctors or scientists when they grew up, Dunafon aspired to one day own the Taco Bells his father once did.
“[My vision of owning the Taco Bells] was off and on when I was younger,” Dunafon said. “I wanted to be a firefighter, astronaut, all of those, and I wanted to follow my dad’s footsteps, too. All the classic [jobs first,] then the Taco Bells.”
Dunafon could be the third generation Dunafon to own the Taco Bells in Columbia, as well as in North and South Dakota. Originally, Caleb Dunafon’s grandfather, David Dunafon, bought all the Taco Bells in the area when his son, Caleb Dunafon’s father, Cameron Dunafon, was 13 or 14 years old. From there, Cameron Dunafon worked in the stores and also went to business meetings with David Dunafon. Caleb Dunafon began to follow in his father’s footsteps when he was in eighth grade as he attended his first Taco Bell business meeting, though he visited other Taco Bell events before.
“When I was little, I would go to Taco Bell conventions with my family, and they’d put on a big concert and have Bruno Mars or Flo Rida or someone [to perform],” Caleb Dunafon said. “I’d go to Taco Bell conventions, look around, get a bunch of free stuff, I guess. So that was pretty fun.”
The summer before his freshman year, Caleb Dunafon began working at one of the Taco Bell stores in Columbia as a crew member. Caleb Dunafon worked the cash register, washed dishes and made sure the lobby and kitchen were clean. He realized his father would never simply hand down the business and decided he would have to work his way up the ranks to business owner if he wanted to take over some day.
Though Caleb Dunafon has a path already carved for his future career, other workers are not so lucky. While Caleb Dunafon will have to work for his position, Forbes.com found many people can hardly even get their foot in the door. Though the United States’ unemployment rate is the lowest it has been since 1960, there are still more than six million people unemployed and working to find a job.
One of the more common achievements many people work for besides a job, however, is acceptance into college. With 19.6 million students projected to attend college in 2018, according to a study by the National Center for Education Statistics, college is presumed to be the second biggest landmark after getting a license or graduating high school.
University of Missouri—Columbia Admissions officer Patrick Elmore believes college is a significant milestone because attending is often the first time students move away from their families.
“Being accepted to college [is] a wonderful goal. Attending college will continue to offer students opportunities that they might not have otherwise. It doesn’t matter if it is attending a trade school, community college or a four-year school,” Elmore said. “The reaction to being admitted to college varies greatly from student to student. For some, it is relief of finally accomplishing something that they have worked on for years. Others are thrilled to get into their dream school. It is always a positive impact to open an acceptance letter.”
Just as some students worked steadily to get accepted into college, senior Bradley Snyder has continuously worked toward a goal for over a decade, though more for personal enrichment than for academics. Snyder’s participation in Boy Scouts of America (BSA), an organization he joined in the first grade, aids his future by supplying him with invaluable life experience.