<p>What is normal? In my experience and observation, high school kids do better academically when they are involved in extra curricular activities. The extra curriculars are also social activities for them - doing something as a ‘team’ in an activity of common interest. They learn time management, keep their minds and bodies busy and active, and they don’t have time to get bored and think up things that would be, lets just say, counterproductive. It’s good to be involved in your community as well as learning the academics.</p>
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<p>My D is exactly like this. I think that for highly intelligent people (I’m not talking about myself, btw lol), most things in life come easily. My D’s classes/tests/ECs were not onerous to her, rather she handled them with ease and little stress. Socially, she was bored with and uninterested in the high school “party” scene. She has embraced and immensely enjoyed the social scene at her Ivy.</p>
<p>Considering myself one of “those students” (not egotistically, though), I honestly agree with an earlier post that the smartest people truly do tend to get things done more quickly than others. Although they may attempt to do more, sometimes their completion rate is so much more than the coursework can possibly offer, and I find myself with great amounts of free time. Really, the only times I’m not free to hang out are when my dad decides to ground me (for my disorganized room, or other such things). Some people think I’m insane for my load, but I do have time to interact. Although some of that time may be spent on important endeavours (i.e. Science fair, InvenTeams, AMC), much of it is just good old teen fun. This is probably what makes “those students” so attractive to prospective colleges - they can handle their workload and don’t lose their grip on reality or society.</p>
<p>enough of the “im not sure if im a top student”</p>
<p>if you work hard and take a good amount of hard classes with APs your considered a top student i would say…jst my opinion</p>
<p>There are just a few things some of the “top” seniors at my school who graduated last year did:
- Sex
- Drugs and alcohol
- Vandalism</p>
<p>Keep in mind many of these students were National Merit Semifinalists, had 34s and 35s on the ACT, and some did summer research.</p>
<p>The things I mentioned aren’t limited to my school. If you really get to know “top” students, you’ll find out that they’re pretty much like every other student in their social lives.</p>
<p>I hate to sound cliche, but I believe it is just about how one is “wired”. I am a mother of 3 sons that could not be more different and were all raised in the same environment, fed the same foods, etc. etc. My oldest did not put his all into school but when applying himself did well. He didn’t take any AP or honors classes, played violin for 3 years and honor and performance choir for 4. He didn’t have the desire or motivation to go to a 4 year college, but is now 25 and has been a licensed Paramedic for 2 1/2 years. I guess the “light bulb” came on and he found his niche. My second one was the classic “Mr. Personality”, played football, wrestled, honor choir, everybody’s teachers aide and struggled his little brain off to maintain a 3.0 GPA. He will obviously find his thing too. NOW, there is son #3. Remember, same parents, same environment…just processess completely different. From Kindergarten to date, I have never “needed” to go to a teacher conference because I believe he has made 1 B in his entire school life. He was totally bored in school unless he could be in honors or be constantly challenged. He finally found a PA HS in Socal that offers long school hours,(8am-5pm) loads of AP choices, and performance opportunities. Took his SAT once, no study and scored 2110/2400. I just received his AP scores, Calculus - 5, Biology-5 and he is registerd for AP Physics, Chemistry and Macroeconomics next year. How does he do it? I can only think that it is time management, the desire to always be challenged and the honest physical ability to function on 5 to 6 hours of sleep. Some things are just born into you. You don’t teach a 1 year old to sit in his crib and line up his socks all pointing the same way. Sounds like Mr. Monk on tv huh…lol. Seriously, I have watched my 3 grow up and now the youngest is in the process of college applications and auditions. I honestly do not worry about him getting the essays and applications done because I have never had to check up on whether he has met a timeline or not…on anything. With all that said, he does have a social life, but as mentioned by others, they are his peers from dance, accapella choir, theatre productions, etc. When he works, he works hard and when he plays, he plays hard and when he “unplugs”, he rests well. I just think it is the way you are “wired” :)</p>
<p>Top students, IMO, may be “achievers” or “lovers of learning.” My son graduated #2, 18 AP tests, 1600 SAT, Presidential Scholar, NMF, etc., etc. He spends his free time playing piano and bassoon, doing differential equations and physics p-sets (going to MIT next month), playing video games, teaching computer science, and reading. Believe it or not, everything he does is just for fun only, even the science, even during family vacations. He has friends like him, who are going to MIT, Harvard, Tufts, Duke, and U of Florida.</p>
<p>I just play 4-6 hours of games every day. 
Still got into some top schools.</p>
<p>School WAS my home: life is very unique when you attend a boarding high school school 700 mi from home.
With students living right on campus, the result was a very broad school day that spans your every waking hour.
Thus, a typical day consisted of: homework from 9 to 10:30, administrative council 10:15 tues (as student body pres i served as student rep), math tutoring 10:30 (mwf), lunch11:30, student body officers meeting 12 on tues, select chorale 12:30, classes 1:15 to 5:45, supper til 6:10, orchestra tues/thurs 6:10 to 6:50, rec or tutoring from 7 to 8, dorm lobby RA 8 to 11 mon/wed.
The awesome thing about boarding school, is that, since you are living with your friends, school IS your social life. I know that sounds lame, but whether its screwing around in the dorms late at night or groggily waiting in line for breakfast…i mean, you get to know your friends in such an honest way, and my HS years were a beautiful melding of academia and sociality that I dont regret at all having.</p>
<p>There’s two students in my family, my sister and me. Out of the two of us, I am the ‘smarter’, more studious one. I just graduated from high school and will be attending an Ivy in the fall. She is going to be a high school senior this year, and couldn’t be farther from me in an academic sense. She insists on making her ‘reach’ school a state school with a 98% acceptance rate, and is happy to get a C- in a class, whereas I strived for a more perfect academic record. Contrary to what one might think about our social lives, however, I have the more active out of the two of us. During the year, I would not usually do anything too academically intense on the weekends, and went out almost every Friday and Saturday. I would often even go out during the week, I just made sure to be responsible with how I managed my time. And as to what I was doing, I guess you could classify it as ‘normal’ teenage stuff. I would hang out with friends, go to movies, go out to dinner, and yes- go to the occasional party that involved mild illegal acts (some drinking, smoking, et cetra). My sister, on the other hand, would stay home almost every weekend, and rarely left the house. Admittedly, I didn’t have the most ‘active’ social life- some of my equally academically gifted and responsible friends had more active social lives than I, but not because I was more busy, just because I enjoyed quite veg-out time a little more. I did spend a lot of time doing things like homework, community service, and leadership activities, but I never let my social life take a hit (I ended up being voted prom king). I don’t think any one top student has any one type of social life. Some feel the need to give up all of their free time to puff up their resumes, and some manage to have a puffed up resume despite spending time enjoying life. I’d be interested to know which kind of student on the whole turns out to be more successful in life.</p>
<p>P.S. sorry for the long response. I hope it doesn’t aggravate anyone.</p>
<p>After meeting a wide cross-section of “stars,” I must say it varies. Plus there’s that tiny portion of fake stars, aka ones that are mentioned in the same breath but beyond the surface really aren’t as impressive…</p>
<p>My D always insisted on a social life and down time. She had a BF through most of hs and enjoys her circle of friends. She also put a lot into academics and ECs. What she didn’t do much of is SLEEP. </p>
<p>I worry that she won’t continue to get away with this approach in college. OTOH, she was never a big sleeper even as a little kid. Her dad gets by on very little sleep, too. Maybe some people are just like that.</p>
<p>I’m at Duke.
I have a very healthy social life but I wouldn’t consider myself an overachiever at all- just someone who gets by with (I hate to say it) understanding things better and faster than most people.</p>
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<p>Yep. Required sleep is like any other human trait - it varies. Not everyone is the same height, and not everyone requires the same amount of sleep.</p>
<p>I think that, regarding the actual thread topic, it really does depend on the person. Not everybody wants a big social life. Some smart kids want a social life, but not with the jerks who happen to be around them. Most of my college friends came into college undersocialized despite not having had to work all that hard to wildly succeed in school, because they were ostracized throughout their grade school years. Most of them had fine social lives in college with people who had been in the same boat in grade school (it was a perfect safe place to develop one’s social skills, since most others were doing the same), despite having to work orders of magnitude harder than they did pre-college.</p>
<p>I don’t know if I’d be considered top by CC standards (I probably am in that ballpark, but I don’t want to be arrogant!), but I found in HS that I required a LOT of unstructured free-time. I tried doing the whole lots of clubs, lots of activities, etc. What I found was that it was just way too mentally taxing. I worked on a lot of projects in my spare time (some of which were entered in research competitions, many were not (and many were not even research-ish, but more just building cool stuff). For this type of student, I think they often need an environment where they can push everything else out of their schedule and devote large blocks up to 8 hrs of time to their pursuits. I often envy kids who can micromanage quite a few activities, but for me, I just need a lot of time to think about <em>stuff</em>.</p>
<p>Differential, S1 needed lots of time to think about stuff, too. He did his HW quickly so he could get on to the more interesting things…</p>
<p>I’ve learned not to trust people’s own assessments of how their kids spend their time. Not to call anyone on here a liar because you seem truthful and the anonymity helps, but I’ve noted more than a little exaggeration on this topic among the parents I know personally.</p>
<p>Most parents of the competitive sort will not be inclined to admit their child is a grind. It’s so much cooler if their child is just naturally smart and is the type to whom everything comes easy. Besides, if parents don’t say that’s the way it is, then they get accused of pushing their children too hard, right? People also don’t tell the dirty little secrets about their child’s personal life. They won’t admit that their kid has regular melt-downs due to academic pressure because he’s overscheduled with AP’s and EC’s. They won’t admit their kid never sleeps more than 4 hours a night (because then they’d be a bad parent for allowing their child to persist in an unhealthful condition). They won’t let on how much they help their child, even doing HW or research for them. They don’t tell you that their child is teased for being an anti-social nerd. Everyone wants to say their child is well-balanced and has it all together and handles everything perfectly well. </p>
<p>Folks, it ain’t true, though I’ll get blasted for saying it. You simply CANNOT achieve at a high level without a great input of time, regardless of talent. Excuse me, but what kind of AP classes would someone be taking such that you can get away with an hour of HW a night? I don’t care how smart you are or how fast you read, or how much you may already know about the topic–it still takes time to compose a 10-page term paper in your head and type it. Even if the Calculus homework is so easy you could do it in your sleep, you still have to actually write down the answers and that takes time. Even if you can speed read, it still takes a little time to read War and Peace. If you can get by on an hour’s worth of HW a night, then I seriously doubt you’ve gotten a great education. If you truly did, then you must have spent summers reading your AP texts for the next year and that’s how you freed yourself up for the school year. Even exceptionally bright people have to study. </p>
<p>You can be naturally a fantastic athlete, but you also are not getting to a state or national level in your sport without spending a heck of lot of time training. Read the bios of our Olympians if you doubt it. Erin Donohue, who will be competing in the 1500 meters, admits that during high school she had to make social sacrifices in order to be rested for her meets.</p>
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<p>Yup. that’s why S and his friends were nerds together and why it all seemed so normal to me. His closest friends were in nerd camp with him.</p>
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<p>The nice thing about term papers is that you only have to do them once a term for each class. ;)</p>
<p>I would say that during my most hosed high school year (8 APs, plus a grad-level medieval French lit class at the local university for the first term), I averaged around two and a half or three hours of homework per day, some of which I got done on the bus. And I could expect to spend about two and a half hours/day on ECs. Getting 7 hours of sleep (which was fairly typical for me in high school), that still left several hours of free time per day. I was an introverted kid, didn’t hang out with people other than my sister and my best friend that much, but had I wanted a vibrant social life, homework wasn’t preventing me from doing so (though family obligations, namely babysitting my brother, might have).</p>
<p>Now, I worked a heck of a lot harder in college. And I’m much more proud of having worked hard in college than I am of being able to get away with not working hard in grade school - I have no reason to want to lie or exaggerate things coming easily to me. If anything, at the time, it seemed shameful to me that I knew people depriving themselves of sleep to finish their homework when I was spending hardly any time on it (so I took harder and harder classes, so as not to feel like a <em>complete</em> slacker). But really, high school, even my high school, which was generally considered the best in the state, was rarely all that difficult. That’s why I <em>took</em> so many AP classes.</p>
<p>You can’t be an Olympian without putting in a lot of work, no matter how talented you are. But we’re not really talking about Olympians (or the academic equivalent), we’re talking about very strong high school students. You <em>can</em> be very impressive in high school riding mostly on talent.</p>