Every high school had the popular girl, the favorite jock, the weird kid, and the smart kid. Whether or not they were the weirdest or the smartest, the population always seems to come to an agreement about who should carry the title.
But sometimes what the smartest kid in school winds up doing with their life isn't what everyone might have expected.
Or, they might excel beyond even their peers' wildest dreams.
Redditor After_Crab_1921 asked:
"What happened to the smartest kid in your class?"
That Darn Mind-Gut Connection
"He got sick with a rare stomach disease and isn't doing too well."
- VoxMendax
"So, ironically, the smartest kid in our class was me (the bar was low) and my sisters and I all have a rare stomach thing."
"I presented first, got the shish-kabob treatment, and had a very sucky five years. Then it stopped, right around the time my older sisters started dealing with it."
"It will rear its head every few years for a month or just a weekend but overall I’m completely unaffected now (either that or my ability to adjust to a baseline is way op) but my sisters both deal with it daily."
"Their symptoms are less than I went through but have stuck around longer, I figure I speedran it on hard mode."
- Mimovich
"The stomach is closely tied to the brain. (Believe it or not)."
"Kids who underperform or overperform are often under extreme stress at home, and as a result are more likely to develop diseases related to the gut."
"It's a weird thing that has actual scientific studies going into it."
- Character_Tower_3893
Going Above and Beyond
"I believe he works for NASA."
"He deleted his Facebook a while ago (like the smartest kid in our class would do), but that’s what he was doing last I checked."
- gingeritis90
Double the Smarts
"There were two. They were twins."
"They're both geneticists now with PHDs, and they work at the same university."
- iARTthere4iam
It's Not Rocket... Oh, Wait.
"The smartest guy from my high school became an actual rocket scientist."
- TheKaptinKirk
Invented Themselves
"The smartest kid in my school was really popular and was one of my closest friends."
"But when he graduated he left everyone and everything behind, including his family. He even changed his name."
"I found out this little bit of information because a friend went to an academic conference and showed me a group photo and he was in it."
"I exclaimed, 'That’s my friend Pascal!' He kept his first name but his last name was an anagram of his original name."
- whittlingcanbefatal
"I knew a guy who did this! He was one of my best friends' older brothers. He got a degree in German and moved to South Korea for a little while."
"Next thing we knew, he had moved back to his native state but to a small town and had taken on a whole new persona. Different name and all. Apparently, he spoke with a German accent in his new life."
"We met a guy who only knew him as the new version. That conversation was wild."
- Zebulon_V
Too Tragic to Imagine
"He got a full ride to Harvard."
"He did an internship his first summer at Intel and was killed by a drunk driver a few weeks after arriving in California."
"I f**king couldn’t believe it when it happened 25 years ago. I still can’t really."
- bg-j38
Successful Careers
"There are two. I remember one of them crying when they got an A- on a test in seventh grade."
"One of them (the one who cried) is an executive in a Fortune 500 company. Nothing special but making a lot of money."
"The other one is a brain surgeon."
- iamacannibal
Important Medical Research
"She worked at John’s Hopkins doing research with Psilocybin for treating mental health conditions."
- ActorMonkey
Making Big Moves
"He moved to Poland and became a Molecular Biologist."
- AJCleary
Happy Ending for the Gamer
"He went to MIT, works for Apple, and has a very expensive home in California. He also has a wife and four kids and seems to be very happy."
"I remember he was programming games in high school and was valedictorian."
"A big nerd who became a wealthy big nerd."
- BullHorn100
A Unique Trajectory
"My best friend (at the time; we drifted apart and speak only rarely now). He got a Ph.D. at Harvard, studied science in Antarctica, and now teaches at an Ivy League university."
- TriTri14
Eternally Confident
"He's a superstar pediatric neurosurgeon."
"He's also the most confident person I’ve ever met. (Guess you’d have to be, to cut open a little kid’s skull and operate on their brain.)"
- Rainpickle
"I saw some interview during a documentary when a surgeon said something to the effect of, 'Yeah, I come off arrogant at times, but do you want a surgeon who’s not extremely confident in their abilities?'"
- followedbyferrets
"The gift is self-awareness here. I’d trust him with my life."
- Hormone_Monster69
"Yep. There's an infinite difference between narcissism and actual confidence."
- adamjfish
Going Down Different Paths
"I had such a big crush on her and told her."
"We dated, and then she moved across the country to study and is now a Doctor."
"I'm so proud of her even though our lives changed paths."
- No-Plantain8212
An Honest and Kind Life
"He dropped out of college to marry and support the much younger woman he got pregnant (he was 23 and she was 18, but he clearly loved her)."
"Now (30 years later), he owns a boardgame store with a large back room for mini painting classes and games, and he plays dad to half the neurodivergent kids in town."
"He's still married to the same woman, too."
"It's not a high-flying life, but he makes a difference to so many people."
- Yinnesha
Best Friends Forever
"He just accepted a full professorship at a big university in the States. He's a particle physicist."
"He's also my bestie."
- wscuraiii
While the nerds and the smart kids often get a bad rap during middle school and high school, it's wonderful to see how being true to their minds and their passions could truly pay off in the end.
@kileywrestling/Bluesky
