Ever since I can remember, I was known as the smart kid.
I was tested in first grade for the gifted students enrichment program my school offered. I tested high enough to be placed in the program, although I'm not quite sure what I was tested on. Honestly, the only thing I remember about that test was putting together a puzzle of a turtle. Although, to be fair, it was forever ago.
This began what was to be the next eleven years of my life. I was automatically labeled as the smart kid. I did nothing special to deserve said title, and I kind of liked the extra attention my teachers gave me. It felt nice knowing the answers and being able to easily complete my homework. I just thought it was normal not to feel challenged by the work the teachers had the class completing.
By the time third grade rolled around, that whole 'not being challenged enough' thing began to be noticed by my parents and my teachers. I started to do side projects and extra homework and enrichment activities just to make it feel like I was putting in effort. In a way, this estranged me from my classmates who were all doing different work than I was.
Basically, all throughout elementary school my being labeled as the smart kid just consisted of me doing some extra assignments. It wasn't until middle school when my peers started asking me for help with their homework or wanting to work with me on group projects. This was the start of what came to be the worst part about being one of the smart kids.
Now don't get me wrong, I am not saying that I dislike helping others. That's not it at all. What I dislike is being used. I hated when people in my class would purposely not do their homework then come into class and ask to copy mine. I hated when my classmates just wanted me to give them the answers. Even in middle school I realized that it wouldn't help them any if I did that. I was more than happy to explain a concept or help someone understand their homework, but with copying, I realized I was being used.
I remember so often I would tell people that I was sure that not all of my answers were correct and they would brush it off and say of course they're all correct, you're one of the smart kids. That's when I began to dislike that label. I wanted to be seen as a friend and a fellow peer. I wanted to be kind and provide my classmates with help, and all they saw me as was the answers to the odd problems in the back of the math book; something you look at, copy down, and don't think much about.
Thankfully, in my last few years of high school, some people started to realize my feelings on the matter and began just asking me to explain things to them if they didn't understand. That was a relief. I went all through my high school career not having many issues in my classes. I took advanced and AP courses and got straight A's. I barely ever studied for a test and I did my homework while the teachers were explaining a concept I already understood. The summer before college started I had no worries about how I would do in my classes. Straight A's and a 4.0 here I come.
And then that first exam in biology I happened. I got a C. I had studied so hard, and I still got a C. Now to most people, a C is average. To me, I might as well have just failed the test. It had been so deeply ingrained in me that anything other than an A was failure. While I didn't go home and cry over my grade, it did make me do a whole lot of thinking. Was I still one of the smart kids? Did all my intelligence leave my body in one summer?
No, I was still an intelligent person. College is just different. I wasn't still with all the kids I grew up with. I was with people from all over the country with many different backgrounds. Who knows what their high school education was like. I quickly realized I fell very much in the middle of the crowd. Some things I was great at, and some things I struggled with. I had to re-teach myself how to study for a test because I hadn't really studied in so long. I had to make flashcards and do practice problems for hours. I had to painstakingly read every chapter of the book. I had to put in effort. I had to try. This was entirely foreign to me; the concept of trying. Everything had always come so easily to me that I flew through my classes with ease.
After that first semester of my freshman year, I had created a new label for myself. I had long despised the smart kid label, but it had grown on me anyway. I was now the average kid. I wasn't the one to sit in the front row and ask all the questions. I wasn't the one who got the highest grade on an exam. I was the one who sat in the middle of the class, occasionally contributed, and sometimes got terrible grades on exams and homework. It wasn't that I was slacking off though. I was still putting in effort. I tried to balance my classes as best I could, giving myself room for failure in a hard class and room for success in a class I knew I would excel in.
It wasn't easy accepting my new label, but now going into my junior year in the fall, I am proud to say I am an average student, and there is nothing wrong at all with being average.
