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[quote=Anonymous]Another GDS high school parent here. I wouldn't call the atmosphere "cut throat" but I do think the kids feel lots of academic pressure. It's an academically oriented school that is not dominated by the jocks or the preppies or popular kids.  In 9th and 10th grades, there is no/little differentiating by achievement levels so there can be a wide gap between the academic high flyers and "normal" smart UMC kids in any given classroom. It shows up in discussions in class and with each other. My DC says everyone knows who the super capable kids in their class are and it is hard not to compare themselves to the exceptional ones. Most of the high flyers really enjoy having academic peers at their level. And most of the "normal" study harder and work longer to keep up. More often than not, it's the students who load the pressure on themselves rather than the parents. No one should need to do homework until midnight most nights, but some do.  My DC took calculus in 11th grade, but did not consider themselves a good math student because they had friends taking multi-variate already. The student' internalized pressure gets worse in some ways once the college process starts and students start taking the really advanced electives.  "Normal" students shooting for elite colleges can drive themselves well past healthy limits to stay on par with the superstars and there is not much parents or the school can do to get them to stop. [/quote]

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