The purpose of this study was to examine the academic failures experienced by Korean students and to investigate how they overcome those failures. For this purpose, 514 undergraduates attending 4-year universities in the metropolitan area and the southern provinces reported their experience of academic failure as a subjective trauma through an open questionnaire. Among these, 330 cases reporting the academic failures experienced during the high school period were analyzed according to the Consensus Qualitative Analysis-Amendment (CQR-M) procedure. The consensus team, consisting of four members, reached a final outcome through 3 consensus sessions. As a result, categories of the academic failure trauma events, wound left in mind, adaption after failure, and other peoples’ help were derived. Each consisted of 5 categories (failure to pass, low grades, frustration felt during study, high expectation, unexpected events), 5 categories (emotional wounds, impairment of self-image, negative attitudes and emotions for the academic tasks, deterioration of relationship, skepticism about the world), 3 categories(coping efforts, profits of failure experience, changes after failure coping) and 2 two categories (helping person, helping content). These findings were discussed in terms of implications for the understanding of students academic failure as a subjective trauma experience and implications for academic counseling practice.