Do others struggle when their child is less academic than them?

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Hi all, I was wondering if anyone would be prepared to talk about something which is only tangentially related to our jobs! In brief, my DD got her A-level results this week. She has got into a RG uni through clearing - but only just. I am genuinely so proud of her - she is massively disappointed not to have got into her first choice but thinking positively.

The thing I want to discuss is this. Essentially, I think my DD is not amazingly academic. And that is genuinely fine. The difficulty is that she would really love to be academic (I mean, I get it, there's a big emphasis on exam success) and has recently told me that she would like to be one. Quite apart from the shitshow in HE currently, I am not sure this is a realistic goal for her. And I have such complex feelings about it all. I guess disappointment is a big one - not in her, but that some pathways may be closed off for her. Which I also know is true for all of us! And I don't know whether I am also grappling with something less positive - a sort of ... frustration? That she has not inherited the thing I can do. Which is also mad because it truly is about the only thing I can do and it has not necessarily led to great riches or other conventional measures of 'success' - or even, always, happiness.

Anyway ... I guess the question is, does anybody else grapple with complicated feelings if their kids are less academic than they are?

My least academic child lives a wonderful life and has achieved so much through sheer character determination and hard work and volunteering since she always 14. Everyone has their strengths and weaknesses. Yes she got BBC at alevels and scraped into rg uni , a 2:2 for her degree despite her best efforts , but she’s doing more with it in her field of archaeology and heritage than a lot of other students with better grades despite being told repeatedly in school she wasn’t bright enough to get there. She even managed to do a masters part time and get a distinction in the end .
Being academic gets you so far and ta hard work that matters.
eldest got amazing a level grades , 1st for her degree, top grades for her masters plus deans award and is ….a teacher. They both got to where they wanted and how academic they are makes no differed in their day to day life.
youngest has just got A*AB and has opted for a creative degree in ljmu instead of a Russel group uni . The amount of people that have asked her why she’s going there , roll their eyes or ask her why doesn’t she change for a better uni , or like her cousin said why study so much and go there. Each child has their own path . I trust that they will find there ay as long as they work hard and are passionate about what they do . Support your child . You never know how far they will go .

Bit of a mix between the two previous. My dd was very academic in school then completely changed tack at 16 and opted for a creative course at a new uni. (I'm Oxbridge and until then she was on track to follow - or other RG.) Although she had the academic grades she had zero academic interest and honestly I have really struggled with that - just the lack of interest in anything academic - in the meaning of anything and the 'world' in general. I have found our divergent interests really hard. I'm not proud at how hard I have found it - but it has been really hard. She has inherited by ability - but zero motivation or interest.

From a different angle. This year I had a masters student with very academic parents (both) who clearly was struggling to follow in their footsteps and I can see that must also be very hard.

I wouldn't wish HE as a career on anyone right now - but I am disappointed that dd does not have that kind of interest - the mindset. I know it's up to her yada yada but truthfully, I am disappointed.

To be an academic (as in a job), all you need is determination and hard work. I've known many not-particularly smart academics. So I think she's got a chance if she's willing to put the work in. But are you sure she doesn't just want it because she wants to be like you? And not disappoint you?

If you're talking about someone being academic - as in smart or have a curious mindset - yes i can understand the disappointment, but also I'm sure she has other traits you are less good at too?

Thanks so much to all those who have responded, it's so helpful to hear these different perspectives. I mentioned that these feelings are complex and one thing I would underline is that I really don't think I'm disappointed in my daughter (I've asked myself about that) - I'm just disappointed for her. She is a wonderful person - and fairly resilient. One irony is that I excelled academically but was a total mess at her age and throughout most of my twenties. On the intellectual curiosity thing - I have found it interesting that my daughter doesn't really read for pleasure, while I read a lot at her age. I think reading is massively important to becoming a good academic and writer (humanities and social sciences at least). I guess less tendency to read might be a characteristic of this generation. Anyway, thanks all again!

DD20 had a breakdown after the Covid lockdowns and we’ve spent the last few years slowly rebuilding her so I was one of the people genuinely congratulating friends on their children’s GCSE and A level results while DD got none. I got As and am a senior professor in a top RG university. It’s tough and I had to readjust my expectations from which Oxbridge college to delight that she has been able to leave the house.

I'm potentially going to be in this position. I was a swot at school, 7xA and 3xB at GCSE (before stars and numbers were a thing), AAAB at A level. 2:1 from a redbrick, professional job.

DS is not a swot. He's not stupid but has never been a high achiever academically, and he's not willing to work for it either. We're waiting on his GCSEs and I'm not expecting anything above grade 5, if that.

My main worry is that I don't know how to help him navigate the next steps, as it'll be completely unfamiliar territory. And he has completely unrealistic expectations of his future - turning his nose up at the idea of doing a minimum wage job to get some experience and transferable skills. Probably because he's had a nice comfy life up to now. I love the bones of him and have to hide my frustration.

My discipline is arts based so lots of my peers ended up in academia through practice and industry.

I don't think children inherit academic ability. They learn it and perhaps through their individual interests and strengths, can be more/less suited to study, over something more vocational or practical. The arts can combine both of course. My peers have wide ranging backgrounds. Some have been in academia their whole career following PhD, but some of those are really more humanities leaning than arts practice based. Our institution also has lots of teaching only contracts which bring their own frustrations but for some colleagues, this gives a route to academia without a research profile or even a PhD (I don't have one!). I'd say industry experience and practice experience is more desirable in some visual arts disciplines.

My child is still at school but leaning towards sciences. I possibly felt some pang of disappointment when he stopped doing art and he never had an interest in music, but I think that's about me feeling out of my depth. No idea how to help him shape a science career.... I will have to support him and research it with him!

So I suppose my point is that academic careers are not a one size fits all. She could still excel taking a different route to you. She is also still learning and will develop during her UG studies. I think young people mature later these days.

And yes, less tendency to read is definitely generational.

The world has changed. I have fought my own frustrations around this with my undergraduates and my child. . Maybe it's partly that it challenges our sense of self (and academic identity?)

No. My dd is definitely less academic than me. But she’s really far more talented in many other ways.

I kind of think so what about academia now. There are many other ways to do well in life aside from
studying at university. We were all like sheep in my day in the 1990s - did A levels, trooped off to university like good little foot soldiers. And taking a gap year was seen as a radical risk at one point.

Does your DC want to be an academic as thats what shes grown up with? Does your DH have a different type of job? Maybe her ambitions are more about familiarity (she think she knows what your job is like) or she thinks it would make you happy?
Would some career counselling help show her more options?

Totally agree with this
There are more avenues open to young people to pursue their passions which I think is a great thing
One can have all the qualifications but if does not necessarily guarantee a successful or fulfilling career

Thanks so much again for more thoughts (I'm nipping in and out of here while trying to finalise a rather painful R&R)!

There's loads of food for thought here. I guess in one way excelling academically can lead to a more linear pathway - top uni, to top graduate career, etc. Again, it's faintly ridiculous for me to think like this, not least because this is increasingly unlikely even for the most academic, but also my own career has been anything other than linear (and I can think of little worse than many of those top graduate careers). I have also been a very late developer and its only after about 18 years (same age as my DD, coincidentally or not) that my career is starting to accelerate (a little).

So I think the idea that I/we have no route map for what follows is really relevant but also sort of inevitable, because very few students do.

There's something else at play - my DD feeling of being second best, that she's had to settle for the fallback option, while her friends have pretty universally got their first choice (and better grades). This is a good lesson here, that there will always be people apparently achieving more and comparison is not helpful - but since this is a lesson I am still trying to learn at my advanced age, I guess that brings other challenges!

@igmum I am so sorry about your daughter and hope that she can continue to feel better. Given similar difficulties experienced by kids of friends and family I am acutely aware that what I am describing is very much a minor issue, comparatively.

PS on the imitation thing, I think my DD has seen me generally happy in my academic job while my DH has made a lot more money but been extremely stressed in a corporate role. I have never encouraged her in my direction, or in fact any direction, but I think she can see that I have purpose in my role (and I genuinely do feel extremely privileged to do this job, despite what is happening in HE right now).

I was always academic at school in the sense that I was studious and hot good grades and went to university and did well. I would say I am intelligent in an academic way. My son is 18 and is not academic at all. He really struggled all through school and was diagnosed inattentive adhd at 13. He is now doing a vocational qualification connected to sport and is much happier and doing well. My daughter is much more conventionally academic although not the very top of the class either, except in her best subjects, where she gets 8s. (We are not in the UK). She's more similar to me in terms of abilities and interests (humanities). But it's not something for either of them that I really think or worry about. I worried about DS because he was finding school so hard but I worried he would have fewer options if he couldn't tick the right academic boxes and I worried about him being unhappy as a result of that.
But then I grew up with a terrifyingly clever mother who was also probably a bit of a histrionic /narcissistic personality and who was very definitely disappointed in us not fulfilling the idea she had of what we would be. So for me it's always been about my kids just being successful in what they enjoy.

Yes agree - I genuinely just want them to be happy. The stupid thing is I think I have been indoctrinated with the (obviously untrue) idea that academic success = happiness. That somehow, it makes people superior, even. I think that might be what I am grappling with.

Yes, I totally agree. It's hard to step away from the all pervasive sense that top grades is the be all and end all or even a predictor of future happiness.

I’m Academics daughter. I never had any pressure as mum always believed in letting us find our own feet and path. But she made sure I had cultural experiences above the norm and our discussions were intellectual from about aged 5! I love language and words and science and always have done. I think my mum gave me a start no one else could have and incoming it is hereditary.

Anybody you speak to about my mum will tell you how intelligent she is. She is also a workaholic. But she was so focused on the enrichment she forgot the soft stuff. Helping me make friends, play dates, relationships, all passed her by so whilst I felt well supported educationally, it very much felt like they was the sole goal. And all they mattered was academic success.
In terms of being academic, there are so many threads to the concept there is no simple definition. Is it 10a* at GCSE? It working really hard to achieve above target. Is it strolling into an exams, not revising and getting a B?

I’ve not expressed myself very well as it’s a complex issue but support the whole child not just the education. Spot personal development issues before they become a problem.

I have good job now and I am well know for knowing everything (not a know all this is a compliment!)

Intellectual curiosity can be substituted by hard work. Reading is a generational thing. Even I less now. You said you were good academically and a “total mess” at everthing else- so help her focus on the everything else. She will be ok and will find her own feet.

In a pretty academic family (3rd gen oxford, multiple PhDs and professors), my DD is doing fine but not at that level. She has got into Uni, and I try to give lots of examples of careers that are not linear and allow for shifting about between fields and jobs. So I hope she will end up with something she enjoys. But I do know other kids among her generation in the wider family who have dropped out and work in catering / art / gardening. And that is fine too.

Yeah. My son is very bright and is doing well at school, one of the top in his primary school with great SATs but he's not exceptionally academic. I genuinely was academically exceptional at school/uni, and I expected he would be too. He has a learning disability which was diagnosed when he was 9 - he was always ok at school but now he has the appropriate support he's been catching up and overtaking his peers. But actually, without sounding all corny, parenting him has taught me to value other qualities as well as exceptional academics - he's great at making friends, he's kind and even-tempered, he's phlegmatic and chilled when things go wrong, he's very empathetic and loving, he's funny, he works really hard, and he's fairly good at sports. He's clever but well-rounded, whereas I was and am a type-A personality, very hard on myself, highly-strung and neurotic, anxious and introverted. Completely uncoordinated. He's more like his dad - who is less academic than me but out-earns me as he works in tech. It took me several years to realise that essentially I had wanted a mini-me but it's more than ok that he isn't that.

It's understandable you grapple with it - if you don't believe the hype about academic success, it throws doubt on your success and your own choices. Not that they were bad choices, but they may not actually be the pinnacle - they may be just one option amongst a sea of equals.

In which case, how do you re-evaluate your own success? Are you in fact any more successful than others who are not academic? Does being clever or academic even matter? Teens trigger a lot of midlife reflection!!

Society needs academics, but academics haven't won a big prize that everyone outside academia wishes they'd won, they're just doing a job with pros and cons. Other people are as happy as Larry doing all sorts of other jobs.

For your DD, I'd just encourage her to follow her gut and think about what she enjoys. Her gut will shift as she studies, naturally, based on how studying feels to her and how she gets on with it. You can help by being honest that being an academic is good for those who enjoy it, and awful for those who don't.

My older two read for pleasure and one of them is the least academic, however our youngest reads very little ( maybe 2 books a year ) . There’s a 10 year gap between her and her sisters so you could be right about this generation reading less. Would be interesting to see.

My DD is a lot younger than yours but I also struggle with this a lot. I am academic - grammar school lots of A* and As at GCSE and A-level 1st degree and professional career. My siblings both went to oxbridge. One of them had a slightly more convoluted career path but both professional and successful. My DD probably has ADHD which has made it harder for her to apply herself academically at times and as per previous posts she lacks intellectual curiosity in my view due to being reluctant to read for pleasure. She has a very charming personality and everyone she meets says things like this to me. I’m sure this will serve her well in life but I really struggle with a) helping her with schoolwork when she doesn’t seem able to grasps concepts as quickly as I would expect or her younger more academically able brother is able to - it’s very frustrating b) I am a little at a loss as to how to advise her on careers and pathways in the future especially given the ridiculous cost of university and poor outcomes for graduates especially from some of the less traditional/academic institutions.
the irony is my lovely late dad had very very little education and managed to forge a career - not high flying but financially stable, a job he enjoyed and able to support a family. There are so many paths but when you’ve been on the academic/professional path your whole life it feels the fast track/easiest route to a comfortable and secure life. Thank you for being honest about it it’s a difficult thing to talk about.

Can I just give you all a view frim the other side?
My dd has just done her A levels & has a place to study History & Politics at Oxford.
I'm a hospital cleaner & left school at 16. I'm not sure where my dd gets her cleverness from, I brought her up on my own & its been exhausting.
Im really proud of her but shes so different from me, if we didnt look alike id think she was a changling.
Shes an average teen so i cant even put her intelligence down to sometging like autism.
No i dont want to listen to "In our Time" or some politics podcast, i just want to listen to crappy music.
We watched Hamnet the other night, 40 minutes in i asked "wheres Shakespeare then?". No i couldn't follow Hilary Mantels books - i just want to read my Martina Coles.
Im not interested how "language evolved" or what the big telescope has found in space.
Yes i love a bit of sleb gossip & i havn't got a musical note in my head so no - i dont want to ge taught the guitar!
I know shes frustrated with me sometimes & wishes i was more like her but im just not. I hope she meets all the clever people like her at Oxford, because my head spins some days.
I guess we all just love our kids whatever & thats the thing.

As a mother, I WAS disappointed that my DC didn't inherit my academic gene/ability/whatever. But now, I'm a grandmother. And my DGC has also not inherited it, But what has changed is my attitude.

I have more of a long view now. While I was heavily academic, my DB wasn't. Lots of SEN & struggled massively at school. However, he is the life success, not me. Not that I did badly, but DB is the one who has achieved more post education. He's very very highly respected in his field.

So between DB, DC & DGC my attitude has shifted. Of course, there is the worry that DGC doesn't have such an easy route into work/career, but given that I've now watched 2 generations of not-academics do well, I'm not quite as stressy about it (I still am a bit!).

Thanks so much for all these different perspectives - I didn't expect this response, and was a bit worried people would be more judgemental.

I realise I am grappling with a wider societal system where academic success is highly celebrated and in my professional life, as an academic, we delight in the 'strong' students and sometimes struggle with those who are less so. This is personally an ethical challenge, because we tend to recruit students who are less academically strong (a way to fill places). I hate that we then assess them against criteria which they cannot meet, and which are also quite meaningless in many ways.

Still though, there's this underlying feeling that academic success is something to be admired and celebrated.

I was particularly struck by the comment that academics think we have won a prize - which in fact, others are not interested in! This really hit home, because in many ways I do feel that I have hit the jackpot, being able to do this job. But again, I also realise that for many other people, it would be horrible!

Mine are small but I sincerely hope they are less academic than myself and DH. Although I think he will struggle with it. Being a high achiever comes with a lot of pressure and it’s not all it’s cracked up to be.