What makes a kid popular in middle school?
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Anonymous
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I think it probably depends on the school and the friends. When I was in middle school, being smart made you a nerd, being overweight made you a fatty loser, and the popular kids were the ones who were the tallest and played basketball.
My son is in middle school in FCPS and has lots of friends. I was quizzing him pretty intensely about bullying, popular kids, cliques, etc. He claims there are not really popular and unpopular kids as a rule. People coast around and become friends with people that happen to be in their classes, and then sit together at lunch. He said that if he was asked to pick out "the popular kids" that he would not be able to do so, other than one specific girl who tries to be a diva. Although, he does say the NPCs are kids who aren't very smart. Which is a dramatic reversal from when I was in school |
Anonymous
Every boy mom thinks their kid is the nice boy |
Anonymous
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My middle school probably only had about 120-150 kids total.
I think its different with these middle schools that have 750-1000 kids. Sure, there are popular groups, but its also a lot easier for kids to just not care about popularity either. They don't have to interact with the kids if they don't want to. Heck, with a grade of 300 - 350 kids, not all the kids even know each other. My son has the traits of being popular: tall, blond, and a great athlete. He sits at the "football table" at lunch. And he says that nobody cares about popularity. Which I believe is true for this group of boys. I suspect its different for the 8th grade girls, though |
Anonymous
And none are actually nice kids, right? 
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Anonymous
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I'm thinking through this again and I think the number one thing is being self-assured and self-confident. Kids who are popular are self-assured, charismatic, very secure in their own skin----they have a "good vibe."
Honestly, I think you either "have IT or you don't" and this starts at a very early age. It's really impossible to teach this stuff Kids (humans) either have this vibe or they don't! There are many of us with multiple kids who have one who is "naturally cool" and others who are not---despite being parented the exact same way. |
Anonymous
Blond=popular in your mind? Huh, interesting… |
Anonymous
This has been reported as a quality of the popular kids through the thread. I didn't invent the concept of "shallow middle schoolers" It's not different than "tall" being a qualifer either. |
Anonymous
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In my observation, popularity still exists, but not in the same way as when I was that age. (I'm 43 now)
There seems to be 2 kinds of popular: one is athletic, smart kids, this group is mostly boys the other is "bad kids" who dress inappropriately, spend a lot of time on hair and make up, talk back to teachers and get ISS, this group is majority girls This school is mostly Black and Latinx, so I think there are different factors at play. My kid is nerdy and musical, has plenty of friends and is never bullied |
Anonymous
If they have iPhones and are family sharing, and if someone in the family share group has already downloaded an app, EVERYONE in that family share group can download that same app without needing permission, despite age restrictions or the ask permission restriction. The parents probably have no idea about this. The only workaround I’ve seen is to delete the App Store and then disable your child’s ability to add or delete apps via privacy settings on YOUR phone in the family setting. |
Anonymous
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Amazing to see the range of what constitutes popular…I am out west…we don’t have the popular clean cut athlete look that exists back east. It certainly isn’t popular at least.
In middle school, the trouble makers are popular. My kid steers clear. She is well liked but not in the popular crowd. |
Anonymous
I somewhat disagree. For many of the so-called popular kids, that confidence comes from the safety in numbers and it can be very stressful to stay at the top of the heap. My kid has plenty of friends but is not part of the popular crowd. DC has been a target a few times but when she stood up to the nastiness and pushed back, they quickly caved. That confidence can sometimes come from a false sense that they can get away with things like being mean to others, sweet-talking and conning adults to get out of trouble. It's quite often not real self-confidence as much as it is false bravado. Boys are probably different but among girls popular is often code for the horrible nastiness that they use to keep others down or jockey for position among their own group. As I think about the popular kids that I know of, one was already sending inappropriately sexual videos to boys in 6th grade, one was arrested for shoplifting a fairly large dollar amount from a local store, there is unfettered access to social media and a lot of unsupervised time and lax parenting. |
Anonymous
The bolded has not been my experience. I have family sharing but my kids need my permission to download anything, even apps I already have. |
Anonymous
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My kids’ middle school is large; I don’t see this year’s enrollment stats but when my daughter was there, it had over 1800 students for 2 grades. My kids (8th and 10th grade) say that the school is really too large to have just one set of popular kids and that being popular is different than being well-known (for good or bad reasons).
My son has friends in one of the popular groups- some are tall, but not all. All are good athletes and to my eyes, most are not what I would consider goodlooking, but they have a charisma/self-confidence that attracts people. Almost all have behavior that can either border on acceptable or cross that line. All have older brothers, which I think is key. They already know the deal- what to wear, how to act. |
Anonymous
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I feel like I have to explain NPC to a few of you. It doesn’t have anything to do with online.
You’re a main character or an NPC. Like in a video game, you’re the one in the plot. Or you’re a game extra, just walking along the sidewalk or whatever. They use these terms like “Buddy thinks he’s the main character.” So if you’re acting too confident and people don’t think of you as a main character. “Your outfit is NPC” meaning too basic. “I know having my Stanley and Air maxes is sort of NPC, but everyone knows I’m not NPC.” Bumping into a wall “NPC move bruh” “It’s giving main character vibes” Could be good or bad. Mostly bad, because someone could be putting you in your place.” “Jackson has main character rizz. He’s always the center of attention. He’s so funny. But Rodney is always trying to be a main character… so dumb..” |
Anonymous
Yup, same in my experience. We get prompted to provide permission regardless of who else has the app within the family plan. I think PP may have outdated information on that. Bc even if that was the original functionality, that's obviously such a huge process defect that Apple would have fixed that pretty quickly |