Were you only friends with people at your academic level in school?

[LevelHeadNina]

Thinking back, I’ve realised most of my close friends in school were people who worked at a similar academic level to me. No deliberately, it just kind of happened because we were in the same classes, sets or had the same pressures.

AIBU to wonder if others experienced this too? And if you weren’t friends with people at your level, do you you wish you were/weren’t?

Hmmm I went to a grammar school, so I’d say we were all around the same level.

God no, I was bright as a button but an absolute rebel, so all my mates were the cool kids in the lower sets who smoked and bunked off. I look back with so much regret at my choices (not of friends, but at how bright I was and how little I used my ability at the time).

Yes I think, so there was group of about ten of us boys and girls who were all pretty high performing (with one or two outliers). Without sounding like a knob we were a popular group: sporty, academic, social.

What’s really interesting is that the two who were the outliers have gone on to be super successful. As have the rest of the group

I went to a grammar for some time. I was friends with the people in my set - was streamed after yr 8. I got top grades, which meant I went to a very academic university, and as a result I'd say all my friends are actually more intelligent than me.

I went to a selective school so to some extent everyone was reasonably academic, but no I didn't particularly seek out people at my academic level. It wasn't a priority for me at that age, I was much more interested in going out and socialising, so was looking for people who were socially right for me and who I could trust and have a laugh with.

I don't think academic success is necessarily a reliable benchmark of someone's intelligence, let alone their character. There are lots and lots of highly intelligent people who don't thrive in the school system or who don't do well at exams, so I think it would be a bit superficial and limiting to screen people on that basis.

That said, I wouldn't be drawn to people who I thought were stupid.

Curiosity, open-mindedness and a willingness to listen to other ideas is a much more reliable marker of whether I'd want to be friends with someone than what set they were in at school in maths.

Half my friends were like me in the top set and a bit swotty at school.
The other half we're also like me smoking dope at lunchtime and raving in fields at the weekends 😂

Primary school was all mixed ability classes. I guess when I moved to secondary school, in my first year or so, I would have spent most time with those I already knew from primary, who were in my home form but later on friendship groups changed slightly as we all got to know people in shared subject classes , which would have been streamed.

I feel that I had fewer close friends by the end of secondary than I did in Primary. I had a big falling out with my best friend from Primary school when we were around 13, and although we got back on speaking terms a few months later, we went on to develop completely different friendship groups.

I prerry much lost contact with people from school apart from those who went to the same post-16 provision I did, and I do still have friends from that time, including my now best friend of over 40 years. We are of varied academic ability, it doesn’t come up really. I would love to know what my old BFF is doing now though.

Yes more or less. Only because our school was streamed and I was in one of the two top classes. Most of my friends were in my class as we did all our lessons together so got to know each other. My best friend was in a lower stream but we'd known each other since we were little as we lived near each other. Once we were out of class, academic ability wasn't important, we just talked about boys, pop music, clothes, discos, boys, boys and boys.

100% yes. We worked together in sets. It just happened.

I went to a grammar school, so nobody was very far removed from my academic level, but I suspect I would have mostly hung out with people of roughly my own academic level at a comprehensive too.

No, looking back I often made friends with kids from terrible backgrounds. I don’t know why. Academically I was an oddity - very good at English but beyond hopeless at maths and science. I don’t know why but I felt more comfortable around the kids with the bad reputations. Maybe I thought they wouldn’t bully me if I got in with them. More likely it was to do with shit self-esteem. I felt more at home with the marginalised and abused. The pushy, confident, ambitious kids intimidated me.

When I was 16, I went to a very good sixth form college. There were kids there who’d come straight from expensive private schools. I could never get over their confidence and sense of entitlement. I really think we underestimate how big a role low self-esteem plays in poor academic achievement. Many kids fail because they feel that’s what they deserve.

Yes pretty much. My best friend from primary was less academic than me so we weren’t in the same classes, but we maintain our friendship. Other than that, all my friends were in the same sets.

Now I think of it, yes.

But my closest friend since leaving school (who was in my year) was in the bottom set for absolutely everything whereas I was top 🤓

We didn’t mix much until we found pubs and boys in the 6th form.

No. Competition was encouraged and harms friendships with those at a similar level.

It was a selective school with very little setting which probably helped but I think that the 3 friendship groups in my year of 60 were split between the quiet ones (me), the party animals and the horsey girls. I would say that all 3 groups had a fair spread of ability (it was a school where almost everyone went to uni though). I did get on well with girls from the other groups when we were doing extra curriculars eg orchestra and drama etc and shared a house in my second year at uni with one of the horsey girls.

Outside of school my friends were a lot more mixed - mainly Guides and church. Of the two closes to me one went to the same uni as me, the other left school at 16 to do a YTS in horticulture.

My experience was a bit different. I loved learning and school but wasn’t very good at exams so usually in middle sets. My friends were in lower sets, I was bullied by them for my enthusiasm and being a bit different in a reverse snobbery kind of way. I’m still friends with them and they still laugh at me for the things they find strange like going to museums. I didn’t fit in with the handful of high achievers either, they usually had very pushy and strict parents because the school was awful, to be a high achiever you had to have outside help.

I deeply wish I had friends like me, I’m working on it now.

I'd say I was, yes. Other than the odd bête noir subject, my friends all got good marks. There was a bit of a spread in achievement (a couple of people were outstanding, a couple of people were the top end of / slightly above average overall) but none of us did badly. I went to gently selective private schools.

My senior school friends were also pretty similar in terms maturity, bar one outlier. One girl was a decent achiever but was extremely young for her age. None of my friends were cool / hard but we all instinctively knew she was a real innocent and tried to protect her!

Yes, but then I went to a selective entry school so we were all at a similar academic level anyway. At my school friendship groups tended to form along economic rather than academic lines.
At the school I work in I see a mixture of both. There are many students who have friends outside of their immediate academic ability group (for want of a better phrase), but others who don’t. For the latter, I think it often tends to have more to do with emotional maturity than academic ability.

Our form groups were created by academic ability and happened to contain 2 friends from primary. Another friend was in a lower ability form and we kind of lost touch throughout the time at school but she and another (new) friend became close, which was good. I’m still in touch with one of the primary friends and the new friend, over 30 years later.

I was at grammar school so we were all fairly similar.

My daughter at a high achieving comp seemed to make friends with the cleverest girls there. Most peoples idea of heaven but I don't think it did a lot for her academic self confidence - I still have to try and remind her she is quite bright and has other good skills as well, despite not having a row of A stars.

Yes I think that happens naturally, people tend to gravitate to people who are similar to them. It isn't by design but it happens.

I moved around a lot so was only in any particular school one year at a time. I didn't really reach out to make friends, and just became friends with whoever adopted me. These groups varied from the top to the bottom. Personally, I was a poor achiever. I everyone fondly.

I guess my friends have always been clever although I’m not in touch with any from my grammar school. I only ever went out with clever men. I sought them out 😂. At one point I was the only non PHD student in my friendship group. I’m not phd clever at all.
My husband isn’t well educated but he’s incredibly intelligent which is what attracted me to him.

My friendship group now consists of dentists, professors, teachers, vet, prosecutor, nurse and farmers.

I hope you do manage to make some new friends who are kinder to you @Friendinfluence. Your ’friends’ don’t sound very nice .

No, not at all. I went to a school in an inner city suburb, my friendship group was diverse, in terms of race, colour, religion and academic ability.

I wonder if that was unusual.