<p>My kid brings so many contradictions to NMF. Football player (will be a varsity player this year) and may be NMF with 236 PSAT. Earns $$$$ in summer science research; but he is a school newspaper editor. He love politics more than science and math even though he is done with most AP sciences and beyond in high school. </p>
<p>He is outgoing personality and penchant for public policy and volunteer work. he has his own radio show where interview NFL players.</p>
<p>Yep, and my NM Scholar son is 6’1’’ tall and a ranked tennis player. And my NMF daughter was a gymnast. So much for stereotypes!</p>
<p>It’s probably more likely that the people with 6-foot athletic NMFs as sons are going to respond here. There are probably a lot of parents whose NMF kid matches the OP’s description who are a little bit reluctant to admit it in public like this.</p>
<p>TourGuide,</p>
<p>Although this is a website that permits anonymous posts, you have a good point. Most people wouldn’t describe their child as nerdy - although our neighbor delights in describing her Duke son as nerdy because she associates the term with people who put academics first. Still, the OP’s description does not mesh with the male NMFs that I observed in our son’s senior year.</p>
<p>I had the same thought–no one is going to get on here and say–“you’re right–my NMF kid IS pale, fat, and uncoordinated!” OR “what do you know, my varsity athlete IS a ‘C’ student!” But stereotypes do come from somewhere–and the jock/geek ones seem true, in general. (Actually, I would describe my kid as a geek). Out of curiosity, I looked up the 12 NMFs in my high school class.
9 guys, 3 girls. Not a varsity athlete among them–in a VERY sports- oriented school. Several were unknown bookworms with NO extracurriculars. Most participated in things like speech/debate, math/science club, chess club. One I remember was a D&D/druggie. One was a vocational student. All were skinny & nerdy…no surprises there.</p>
<p>Atomom,</p>
<p>The question is what are NMFs like now? I don’t know how old you are but 20-30 years ago male NMFs may have been more geeky. Similarly, more girls wanted to be cheerleaders than honor students. Many of today’s kids are supermen and wonderwomen, excelling at academics, ECs, and sports.</p>
<p>Im a class of 2010er… Im not a NMF but I am NM commended as well as a National Achievement scholar and a 4 year varsity sprinter(recruited), and to an extent I am going to have to back the OP up on this one… while many NMFs play sports they often play sports such as tennis, golf, Xcountry, not any of the big time recruiting sports(basketball, baseball, football, etc.). Most of the NMFs are really pale and just goofy looking when compared to the “cool” kids… yea there are a lot that dont fit the stereotype but the majority do.</p>
<p>EDIT: And those supermen/women arent usually NMFs… yea at every school there is that gorgeous star athlete with a 4.0 and killer ECs but for some reason those kids rarely make NMF, the majority of NMFs are true nerds not the pretty cheerleader/class president/4.0 student</p>
<p>There are very different answers being given here. Of course, people are different all over but I have the impression the answer may vary based on the region or size of the place in which the commenters live. Could it be that the answer to this question varies depending on whether you live in the south, north, east, or west? Or maybe if you live in a city vs. suburban or rural area?</p>
<p>I live in Texas in an area that has approximately 250,000 people. As a group, the NMFs (male and female) do not seem more goofy, nerdy, or frail than the rest of the student population. They are moderately popular although they are not typically the most popular kids in their schools, generally because they don’t drink alcohol much or at all. Of course, I’m a parent. Maybe other kids think they are excessively nerdy and that explains the different answers here.</p>
<p>DRJ4: One thing is certain: All the NMF kids of CC parents are supermen and wonderwomen! </p>
<p>But I honestly think these superkids are the rare exceptions–most people are not great at everything. Most people have strengths and (gasp) weaknesses. And they tend to put their greatest efforts into the areas where their talents are strongest.</p>
<p>Another interesting thing I noticed regarding the NMFs in my class: I don’t think any of them were ranked at the very top of the class. Most were probably in the top 10-15%, a couple were slackers, but no vals, sals, or top 10 students.</p>
<p>I don’t think geeks of the 70s and 80s were any geekier than today’s geeks. It’s just those weird hairstyles they wore back then. . .</p>
<p>Mine is well-built, not over or underweight, runs for exercise but has never played a sport. Not a retiring nerd that spent his HS years just studying though - he’s been heavily into the peforming arts since middle school, spends countless hours rehearsing and performing (still is at college) and just got the part of Billy Bigelow in Carousel next term. </p>
<p>So let’s call him a scholar-artist rather than a scholar-athlete. Consider - wouldn’t our society be poorer without Matthew Broderick and Tom Hanks (and I suppose I should now add, Gordon McRae)? </p>
<p>What 90 million Frenchmen and College Adcoms know: Many hands hold up the sky.</p>
<p>Atomom,</p>
<p>You’ve highlighted another difference that I find interesting. In my area, the NMFs were also the top of the class in GPAs and the valedictorians and salutatorians at our area high schools. As for 30 years ago, I agree our appearance and hairstyles were geekier. Kids today seem more attractive and accomplished than in the hippie days when I grew up.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Uh, as I’ve said before, my NMF kid is nerdy, more like wonky, and happily so. He doesn’t put academics first, though, and has a ton of friends. In fact, he put his myriad EC’s (none were athletic) first this year at college and got a bit lower grades than he wanted. I guess he puts ideas first, life of the mind stuff. We joke that we can see his brain pulsating from 20 yards. And, yeah, he’s pretty pale, but not overweight, actually reed-thin and tall.</p>
<p>Well, something else. If you look at the original post, Backhand complains of NMFs being “overweight” or “underweight” and not “toned.” So basically, he’s not talking about a description of attributes these kids shares, he’s talking about how they don’t measure up to an ideal of physical perfection (“muscles, trimness, and tone”). </p>
<p>Look around any decent sized group of people. Very few are going to meet Ken and Barbie standards of perfection. Standards, might I add, that have very little to do with fitness. Very few of the men on the construction-type crews I work with would be considered really buff and toned (sorry, guys). Yet I’ve seen these somewhat overweight or underweight and anemic-looking guys climb up a narrow staircase that winds to the top of a 40’ high tank–carrying 35-50 pounds sometimes–and do it repeatedly, going up and down as many as 5-6 times a day, in 95+ degree heat, wearing heavy flame retardant suits (doing heavy physical labor, between forays on the stairs). I guess it’s fair to say that when they get off work they do shuffle a little when they walk; they’re tired as all get out. Backhand might not find these men attractive enough to be eye candy for a college campus, but I would hardly consider them unfit. (Many of them are fine husbands and fathers, too).</p>
<p>Pressuring college age students to look like Ken or Barbie can contribute to eating disorders (epidemic on some college campuses, and sometimes fatal for young people) and steroid abuse, which can be just as devastating.</p>
<p>ETA: If you look at your average professional football, baseball, or basketball team, not all of them have Ken doll bodies, either.</p>
<p>More orthodontia these days. More Accutane. More tanning booths,
hair dye and brand/status clothing and accessories. Less acceptance of physical unattractiveness (the whole reason why this thread was started?)–and more eating disorders, steriod abuse, suicides etc.</p>
<p>But there are also more overweight kids because there is more sitting in front of computers(ahem) and TVs going on than neighborhood games/sports.</p>
<p>Maybe it is cooler to be a geek/nerd NOW than it was back then. Geeks have their own subculture/style. Back then they were just dorks who didn’t fit in. I think there was more tolerance of bullying in schools back then.</p>
<p>hahaha ok so I’m an NMF and I like to think i’m attractive too lol.</p>
<p>as for the athletic thing my school had 9 NMF’s and 6 of them played sports for the school. I personally played tennis for my school for one year. Other than that . . . I’m 6’ 3’', spend about an hour working out and an hour playing basketball with friends almost daily so I like to think I’m fairly well toned muscle wise. </p>
<p>I still do what you may think is common for ‘geeks’ however although anyone who knows me would never give me that title. I’m an officer for the debate team, get good grades. Getting good grades and standardized test scores doesn’t mean that they are geeks.</p>
<p>so in other words I don’t see how being smart/intelligent detracts from physical appearance or conditioning, which this thread seems to imply.</p>
<p>Another interesting thing I’ll throw out for comment. </p>
<p>People view other people in context. As soon as a label is attached, a stereotype pops up in one’s head. But if a group of kids gets marched out on stage with no announcement – and you have never seen these kids before – would you be able to guess right away what they were on stage for? NMF recipients? Scholar-athletes? Maybe sometimes and in some cases, but not always. </p>
<p>Not all kids who are athletes look like athletes when they’re in regular clothes. Stand nonathletes with a group of known athletes and you might not be able to pick out the ones that aren’t. </p>
<p>My friend and I joke that her eldest son is a “chameleon” kid. If he’s with his friends from sports – club soccer and track – he looks like an athlete despite the red hair and pale skin. When he’s with his computer science and art class friends, he looks brainy and artsy and not at all athletic. The thing is, this kid thinks both groups of his friends are “cool” kids.</p>
<p>DD was NMF and val; played varsity sport in HS, was heavily involved in debate. She is/was social and looked fairly athletic. DS will be NMCom and has high class rank (6/470). He’s thin, tall and lopes along like most tall teen boys do. He plays tennis - he comes across as a regular dude. Nah… Other NMFs at their school meet the “regular kid” category also in terms of athleticism and social life.</p>
<p>My son, an NMF a few years back, was 5’10", played ultimate frisbee and scuba-dived almost daily at the time he became an NMF. So no, I don’t think the stereotype is valid.</p>
<p>Hahaha, I’m an NMF and I play tennis. It’s funny though because the only school on my list in which I would be considered a jock is where I’m headed (Caltech).</p>