>>10826525Not really, basically had the polar opposite experience you had.
I was in the strongest academic school in my country. Our dux studied architechture which was an inspiration to all of us that you didn't need to study the hardest programme you could get into just for the sake of it, but to do what you enjoy. The runner up ended up doing a PhD in civil engineering. Then a kid going into medicine, a MechE then me. After me it's mostly engineers, medicine and some math/physics/chemistry. The below average kids did law, finance etc. I had way higher grades than I aimed for, I just wanted to keep my provisional acceptance into engineering. Physics wasn't big back then, currently most dux's from my former high school go into that. I wouldn't say I was remarkable in high-school, but I was near the top, I was formally recognised for my overall contribution to sport, culture and academics at the school. People have always recognised me as "smart", but since I never thought much about them it wasn't really a compliment I cared about.
At university I met some actually smart people. Some kids from high-school did poorly in real academia, but they were generally doing well. I did postgrad because I was offered an interesting project that I loved to work on and I was really bored at my industry research position. At some point I made a breakthrough and people I respect started calling me a genius. This is really bad for your ego long term because then you get to a conference with some truly smart people and you realise that even though your own advisers went to the same top brand American universities, they aren't really known by these people unless their in exactly the same field. Your own research isn't important to them etc.
This kind of made want to quit academia. My mistake was staying in my hometown instead of applying for postgrad at those top tier institutions. You can do really useful research that they respect, but that's not how the game is played.
