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Young Students Hiding Academic Talent To Avoid Bullying
jones_supa writes "The recent anti-bullying survey conducted by ABA brings up some interesting findings. According to it, more than 90% of the 1,000 11-16 year-olds surveyed said they had been bullied or seen someone bullied for being too intelligent or talented. Almost half of children and young people (49.5%) have played down a talent for fear of being bullied, rising to 53% among girls. One in 10 (12%) said they had played down their ability in science and almost one in five girls (18.8%) and more than one in 10 boys (11.4%) are deliberately underachieving in maths – to evade bullying. Worryingly, this means our children and young people are shying away from academic achievement for fear of victimization."
In Asia, overachievers and well-studying kids are looked up to. While that still doesn't make them the 'cool' kids, they do just fine socially and have no such problems as TFA.
I suggest North American culture change its stigma of nerds, geeks, and intelligence, or face vastly deteriorating social values and social/scientific progress.
Concealing your true skill level is something different than slacking down to that level. As long as you're getting into the schools you want, it absolutely doesn't matter what your junior high grades were after you finish college/university - and most bright kids do go on to higher education. Knowing this is a temporary situation some kids may be simply showing a bit of street smarts by not provoking an inferiority complex, I don't think just among bullies but also among your social circle that consider themselves your peers. As people grow up they'll act less immature about it and they can return to their true skill level.
The only exception for that is if you're bright enough to skip classes/years, but that has its own sets of pros and cons. I've met a few that were clearly math wizards, at 10-12 they were dealing with math for 15-20 year olds and had accelerated classes with much older students. And they were all kind of odd and I don't mean because they were obviously bright and skilled, but they'd been hanging around older people so much they were like awkwardly premature adults. They saw kids their own age much like an older teen would see a bunch of brats and at the same time they didn't really fit in with the older ones either. If I knew I had a really bright kid I think I'd worry less about reaching his full genius potential and more on not raising a Sheldon.
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
Exactly.
Are you bullied because of your 98% score in the maths quiz? Or because you're a weirdo who picks his nose, and stands way too close when trying to have a conversation?
In my experience at school, the most bullied people weren't smart. One was smelly (he must have had constipation and some faecal leakage I guess, and his home didn't have a shower, only a bath) and would have only been about average academically - he turned out okay as an adult I remember. Another kid I remember used to insult someone randomly, then run away because he knew he'd get the bash. I remember at a school concert him sitting on his mother's knee, he would have been 15.
I remember being punched in the stomach once for no reason, but that was by an older kid who would have had no idea about my grades. Probably because I was weak looking and he didn't like my hair or something.
Sure my friends/classmates might have said something like "geek", or "schoooolaaaaar [said sarcastically]" or whatever we said in 90s, but no-one was actually bullied for being smart - just occasionally for the baggage that can come with being academically smart. Being smart was a good thing, because at least that could explain some of the weirdness and was a valued skill.
My thought is that "bullying" now means "said something mean to me once". Whereas I think of it as the daily harassment of someone with constant verbal barrage, destruction of property, deliberate ostracism, demeaning and devaluing comments about the victim, and physical violence and irritation.