We’re are you popular at school?

I was never popular. Bullied a lot in junior school although there were a few friends - mainly others who weren't popular. Secondary school was no better. I was plain, bad at sports and generally unlovable, so it was understandable

Not sure I was popular, but definitely a ringleader if any pranks were planned! I was terrible at sport and so was always picked last for teams. Except for swimming,
at which I excelled, because my small stature didn't matter as much and my poor eyesight (lack of stereoscopic vision) was less of a handicap. The sporty girls (netball and hockey etc.) were quite cliquey. It was an all girls state grammar school and still is. But I did enjoy my time there and am still in touch with around a third of my year group, more than 50 years on! We had a school centenary reunion in 2019 and it was lovely! There were some girls there with whom I had never been particularly friendly, but I was struck by how lovely they had all become as mature adults. I think I am less judgmental now and look for the good in people. I often wish I could go back to school but with the life experience I have now. I would be a much better student! I did get to university, the first of my family to do so and still quite a rare thing in 1976. Going to university was more a result of influences at school than at home, so I am grateful. My mum and dad were supportive in the end but initially did not want me to go! In later life, my late father acknowledged that it had been a good decision. But I had to fight to be allowed to go, because my father thought that higher education would be wasted on a girl who was only going to get married and have children! Unlike my daughter, I did have a long break from working (as a teacher) to be a stay at home mum, which I have never regretted. Sadly, this is a luxury few can afford now.

I've told this story before, so apologise for repeating it. Imagine taking a 7 year old out of class (me) with no explanation, putting them in the back of a van alone. The van stopping, being taken out, still with no one speaking, marched through what I now realise was a delousing centre, having your head deloused, taken back to the van, then the class with nothing said. I was never going to be popular. My confidence was shot from an early age.

Can't say that I was as I tended to keep my head down and just have a small circle of friends - some of which I am still in contact with now!
The same year that my marriage broke up and I returned home, I was persuaded to attend the school reunion with my older brother (we went to the same grammer school) and had what I can only describe as one of the worst evenings of my life!
I finally caught up with the girl that had been my best friend at school but it was really upsetting that very few other people remembered me!
Not what I needed after feeling totally flattened by my marriage breakdown!

I think this is a really interesting thread! So many have said they def weren’t popular at their school and I have to say, this does make me feel a little better about my own schooldays. I went to an all-girls grammar and I wasn’t in with the in-crowd at all and had very few friends. I’m sure it was because I was probably boring and also slightly weird, or just, you know, what the younger people today say…. “Meh”!!
At a school reunion about fifteen years later, I was voted “girl most changed” haha….. I went into a very gregarious type of job and made many friends for life and just came out of myself, basically.
When I had children, I desperately wanted THEM to be popular. My son was in a niche small group and also met his lifetime partner there when he was 14. My daughter, I was thrilled to find, was very popular and always in the “in” group. I was so happy for her as she’s a really nice person, very interesting and very kind. She’s somehow got a finger on the pulse with current trends - a skill she’s always had - so I think that possibly also helped. But due to my experience, I told her there would be girls on the periphery, always looking in but that would probably never make it to the popular group and to therefore always look out for them and be kind, and to try and include where possible.
If my one or two friends were off school for any reason, I just remember wandering around on my own at break times, feeling a bit embarrassed about it, but I don’t think anyone particularly noticed!

Oh yes Sara They were very cruel. The nuns were as bad.

Being 'odd' can certainly get you picked on in life as well as at school! We all have a bit of a herd instinct which is why fashion survives as most people want to look like their peers! I was definitely odd at my all girls' boarding school. I was tall, wore glasses, my parents were divorced and I lived with my father - almost unheard of in the 50s. However I found that I could make people laugh and it was a very unsporty school so not being picked for any team was considered a bit of a triumph! Hated school with all the petty rules, but was quite popular with the girls - not the staff!!! Was expelled in the end for disobedience. Since then life has been pretty peachy. My GC seem to love school and get glowing reports - can't think where they get that from!

Never picked for sports, but didn't mind that. Regarded as uninspiring, but what did they know? Stood for election as head of house and was asked to withdraw as I didn't stand a chance. Wouldn't stand down as was mocked for stupidity. Won the election. Supported the underdog ever since.

I was not popular at school, initially. I found out a few years ago from one of my brothers, that i had passed my 11+ but was never told as there was no money for the extras i would need to go to grammer school. I remember being sent to the local comprehensive school, which was awful for quiet timid girls like myself, Two of my older brothers however were able to go to grammer school(I am one of ten children). My parents were feckless and happiest at the pub, we more or less looked after ourselves. On reflection it would have been awful to have gone to grammer school, we never had decent clothes, i would have stood out like a sore thumb., even though i think i would have been bright enough to cope.
I think there are lots of women like myself, who have lost out on things because of our upbringing. I can understand the povery we experienced because of how many of us there were, but parents were at the pub most of the time. I cannot forgive my mother for letting me go out into the world to face humiliation, pity and being ignored as the scruffy kid from that household. She could have made sure we were clean, fed and at least up to a standard of our peers.
I know i am not alone in an upbringing like this.
I remember being unable to understand some of the maths formulas in class, asking the teacher, being told i should have grasped it by now, so slinking back to my seat feeling totally inadequate.
However, i did become popular in my last year at school, as i was very quick witted and amusing. Some people became friends, but never kept in contact at all.
Aint life hard for a lot of folks?

I seem to remember we all took something called an Intelligence Test before being put forward for the 11+ which wasn’t compulsory. I passed much to my surprise and went to the first co-ed grammar in my area. I wasn’t popular but not unpopular either and loved my time at school.

No I wasn't. Think it was because I was 6ft even at 14.
Always with the odd ones rather than the popular girls.
Still find it hard to fit in.

I can't believe it! at last I'm in a group lol, I always felt I wasn't popular at school although I have bumped into
people from school and they always remember me, I was very lonely and lacked confidence, I couldn't wait to leave and life has always been easier for me since leaving

Kate
I can hardly believe a person in charge of small children could be so cruel. Poor little you, that must have been horrible.
Interesting that we were all picked last for the netball team, wonder if any of us were ever picked first.

No. I was always the odd one out. Still am.

Our teachers were cruel too in infants/juniors. What sort of person would stand a terrified five year old (me) on a box in front of the class because I was so scared I wet my pants, and say to the class 'Look what this dirty little girl has done'. And so it went on.....

No not one of the “popular” girls. Just in my little group of best friends.

The popular girls tended to be attractive, adapting their school uniform to a more modern look and hair styles to suit. They also appeared to be popular with boys outside of school.

I guess it was what the rest of us hoped for but didn’t achieve until we were older?

I wasn't particularly popular at school. I had friends in different groups but I wasn't in the popular girl group as such. I was fairly miserable as a teenager but what saved me was joining a youth drama group and making good friends from other schools.

Sara1954 Yes, it was horrible and humiliating and gave the "in-crowd" even more ammunition to fire at me.

I wasn’t in the trendy group but somewhere in the middle. I always had a ‘group’ I was part of. I was horribly shy in those days and I feel annoyed with myself, thinking back. Things at home were difficult because my mum had a mental illness which inhibited me and meant I didn’t ask many people home. For me it was very liberating to leave home forever at 18, I changed my whole personality and gained a lot of confidence. Had a ball at teacher’s training college, loved every minute of it.

Trisha
How horrible, why would a teacher be so cruel?
I think everyone in my school dropped their aitches, it wasn’t till I went to college that my tutors would pick me up on it.

Loved Primary school and had many friends, all living locally. Then I went to a rather "elite" Grammar School in north London and things changed. Only 60 girls per year, most from "professional" families, unlike me from an ordinary working class family who happened to be bright. For the first year I worked hard and won the Form prize and from then on I was a marked girl. Horrible bullying by the popular in-crowd. To my shame I "dumbed down" in order to avoid their attention and became a bit of a problem-child, disruptive and with a don't care attitude. Somehow I pulled my socks up in the 4th and 5th years and passed all my O levels, and left half way through the sixth form (I just couldn't bear it any more). The teachers were as bad. I was thrilled in the 2nd year when I was chosen by the drama teacher in a leading part as the French wife of Charles I. Then she spoilt it all by telling me in front of the whole class that I had been chosen because I dropped my aitches naturally and would have no problem with playing a French woman speaking English...............

I was never picked for sports either, which suited me because I hated it.
I was quite involved in the drama department, always had a big part in any productions, but I don’t think that made me popular.
At about thirteen I became best friends with a girl, and realised I didn’t need to be in with the in crowd, it was exhausting, never knowing from day to day if you were in or out.

Party4 I am impressed by the number of schools you managed to get through. I am another forces brat and chalked up 10 schools, most of them primary schools as at 11, like many forces children, I went to boarding school. Otherwise my school count would have risen to 12 and I would have returned from Malaya to the UK the Easter of the year I did A levels.

I recognise all the new girl problems you describe. The main effect for me was I never really learned the art of turning acqaintances into friends. As you were always moving on you never made continuing and sustained friendships, just pleasant acquaintances who you never saw again after you left one school and moved on to the next

Being a forces child I attended 15 schools usually starting mid terms.Always the new girl and having to sit in class,dining room in a spare seat due to someone being absent, then moving seats when they returned.Picked on for having an accent or talking posh. I was always playing catch up with subjects and never belonged.One teacher decided to test my level of maths by asking me to do algebra in front of class on blackboard.I had never been shown algebra and was made to feel stupid. I had been taught French for 2 yrs to a higher standard than new class which seemed to annoy the teacher who then appeared to take instant dislike to me.I hated school and feel the whole experience has affected my adult life.

I don't know if I was popular at school, but I was never without friends to join up with for a bike ride, a swim or a game of tennis. Only made the second XI for hockey and was a very 'last resort' for tennis matches. It wasn't the kind of school where being brainy made you unpopular - just a typical Scottish local academy.