In various Threads decrying America’s many faults, I find a meme:
American students who excel strongly in academics are resented by those students who do not.
Often true.
But, is it exclusive to Americans?
Do students in your native lands resent academically gifted students?
Yes? No?
Please post, & explain.
Canada - not particularly resented I don’t think. Admired generally, assuming the person isn’t an obnoxious ass.
I was in various gifted programs in school and no one ever gave me any trouble about it.
Not in Australia, to the best of my knowledge. Although being academically gifted and geeky might cause you some problems, but that’s all to do with the geekiness. In my high school the top three academic performers were not picked on or resented.
In Spain they’re not pointed out (at least not as part of the school system, see at the bottom). There’s no “AG classes”, no “honors”, none of that. I know people who had problems with their social surroundings (relatives, neighbors) due to those people thinking the kid was “getting on airs due to all that schooling” - most often, the kids were the first in their family to get to HS and wanted to go to college (which all of them did, although in some cases it had to be via UNED, the long-distance university); in some cases, this led to the adult relatives setting their kids to bully the “weird cousin”, and the cousins would call upon their friends. Most teachers would do their best to put a stop to any kind of bullying, though, and like I said it did not originate with the kids.
In my school and for “sit down” subjects, and starting in preschool, those students who were best in one subject would be paired up with the worst ones; you could be tutoring someone in one subject and getting tutored in another. And not getting any tutoring in a subject where you sucked because it wasn’t “sit down”. My nephews go to the same school and they’re already doing some tutoring; the system has been extended to not-sit-down subjects (music, phys ed). It’s hard to be resentful at someone who’s helping you and doing it right (unlike some adults, kids won’t talk over another kid’s head).
I did have a teacher who bullied any above-average kids. Saying “Adolf Frankenstein” within hearing of any of his former students, or of any friends or family of his former students is an amazingly vocabulary-widening exercise. I once heard a former classmate, now a doctor, wish upon him a laundry list of illnesses using their scientific names or the scientific names of their “bug”. Amazing how much more scary that sounds than a mere wish for hemorroids…
Singapore here. I have to say though, what do you mean by “resent”? I mean, gifted students here are admired in a sense, and topping the school or getting into a “name” school is coveted by most students.
I did pretty well in school, and nobody resented me for it - they weren’t friendly with me, but that was because I was a hermitic asshole.
Still, some students do “resent” people who do well in school, simply because of jealousy or whatever. Everyone wants to do well, and those that can’t, envy those who can. Is that considered “resent”?
If we consider just bullying, well, there’s a lot less bullying going on here than in the US in general, I think. I don’t recall ever having someone who was bullied for doing well in school, though. I got pantsed for topping the class once, but it was more in good humor than anything else.
I’m an Aussie who grew up in the western suburbs of Sydney and I was consistently in the top of my year–so were some of my friends. Other friends of mine were average performers. We all mixed.
I was voted school captain in primary school yet also came dux, so I guess popularity and smarts were quite compatible.
Nope. Can’t say I’ve noticed anything like that. Arrogant rich snobs are resented, and they may be academically gifted via good genes and expensive education opportunities, but that’s just coincidence.
FWIW, I’d like to see a poll for Americans, just to compare.
Canada here.
IME, the academically-gifted are not particularly resented, as long as they do not brag about it. If one does, he or she will be taken down fast; but the humble brainiac will be just one more in the gang.
Nope, not here in South Africa. I mean, you likely still get your bog-standard geek-bashing, but that’s for the other facets of … otherness (dress, interests, lack of sporting prowess, etc - the usual), not academic prowess - “normal” people who excel academically are not ostracised, IME. Especially not in places where academic success is seen as one of the few routes out of endemic poverty.
UK and I answered yes - but having read the thread, it seems I may have different standards. I was academically gifted at school and although I’m not saying I was mercilessly bullied, I’m sure I was often picked on for exactly this reason - I suppose it could have been that I was generally thought of as weird anyway - who knows? I also made an effort at school to play down my ability by messing about in class. Will be interesting to see if there are any other UK-responses.
I said no. I went to school mainly in the Netherlands, briefly in the UK, then uni mainly in the UK and briefly in the Netherlands.
I went to schools for gifted kids though, so I suppose it could be different at other schools. But where I was, good marks and being intelligent were always good things. Working hard, however, was still lame 
I’ve never noticed anybody being resentful of gifted students. Ever.
Canadian voting “no.” I mean, they’re resented no more than anyone with more success is resented by humans everywhere.
In Canada, I don’t think they’re particularly resented as a group, but I suspect they’re not particularly resented as a group in the U.S. either. Of course, social misfits here get picked on as much as anywhere else in the world (I imagine), and I think any group of gifted students will have more than its fair share of social misfits.
Yup. Not convinced gifted kids are particularly targeted. Sure, smart kids got picked on in school growing up (American here), but so did dumb kids, fat kids, weird kids, or anyone else socially undesirable. Every smart kid who got picked on likes to think it was *because *they were smart. Nope, it was because you were a dork. Plenty of popular kids in every school in America are bright and get good grades.
I was one of the more academically-minded kids at my Scottish comprehensive, and I don’t remember anyone getting any grief specifically for that. I certainly didn’t. My group at school was a wide mix of backgrounds and abilities - we are largely all still friends nearly 30 years later.
This, this, a thousand times this. I got picked on, but I was an unabashed dork and gave not two shits about being cool (which, with the benefit of hindsight, just means I was trying to be hipster cool before hipsters were cool before they weren’t cool).
I grew out of it by junior year. By which I don’t mean I stopped being a band geek who played D&D, but I also started not affecting open disdain for popularity, football, and such. Lo and behold, when I stopped being an asshole, I stopped being wildly unpopular (except among dorks, who by turns accused me of selling out and asked me how to become popular, then got pissed when I told them it involved selling out).
Ahem.
Meanwhile, the salutatorian was a basketball star and one of the cool and popular kids.
I would disagree with my fellow Aussies and say that in my experience, people revel in anti-intellectualism and give the perceived smart kids a hard time in school. I’m from a country town and went to a rough school so my experience is probably vastly different for that reason.
DUX is a big deal in Australia, there are always some meatheads but smart people are quite OK.
The issue of small minded country towns is more about the tall poppy syndrome, look at Johny he’s gunna move out and get a big job in the city, who the f does he think he is. To be honest though most of us live in the big smoke…
But as a rule Aussies are pretty supportive of brains.
International schools in various countries (so I didn’t answer the poll, since there’s no specific country involved). I don’t remember any correlation between being good at school and being resented or picked on. A few of the less-smart kids definitely resented a few of the smarter ones, but it was an individual chemistry thing rather than a general pattern. There were smart kids at every level of the social hierarchy.
I was smart, and I don’t remember getting any hassle about it. One girl who wasn’t very bright made bitchy comments about various aspects of my personality, including that one, but I don’t think she *resented *me; we just plain didn’t like each other. If I hadn’t been smart, she would’ve found something else to bitch about.