The Geeks Shall Inherit the Earth: Popularity, Quirk Theory, and Why Outsiders Thrive After High School

by Alexandra Robbins

  Eli, the Nerd, indulged in eclectic tastes and was devoted to expanding his knowledge base, whether of academic subjects, global issues, or trivia, even when they did not relate to his schoolwork. He didn’t believe in the concept of normality and, therefore, made no attempt to change his stereotypically awkward image. Regan, whose peers identified her as the Weird Girl because of her alternative style and hobbies (she was also labeled the Artsy Girl and the Lesbian), was viewed as another kind of nerd; her youthful exuberance and unabashedness were often mistaken for naïveté. But while inside school peers excluded her, outside of school people adored her.

  Something about Whitney, the Popular Bitch, made me think that she was not meant to be in the popular crowd; I designed her challenge accordingly. And Blue, the heartbreaking underachiever who was known at school as the Gamer, was excluded because he was unafraid to explore unpopular viewpoints and because of the intensity with which he pursued his passions. When he cared about something, he injected all of his energy into it, “loving it up to the very last five percent,” even if other matters he cared or knew less about consequently fell by the wayside.

  Like most outcasts in school—including many of the thousand-plus people I contacted for this book—these “characters” were excluded because they were different, because they didn’t or wouldn’t blend in. But to me, the qualities that set them apart from their classmates were intertwined with the qualities that made them stand out from the crowd in positive ways. I saw in each of these embattled individuals sparks that convinced me that they would thrive once they left the school setting, characteristics they unveil, amidst their trials and tribulations, throughout this book.

  As part of my argument that cafeteria fringe should be highly valued, I wanted to help the main characters learn to see the value in themselves. So I took an unorthodox approach by offering each of these individuals a challenge in the middle of the school year. In my twist on traditional makeovers, I wanted to know whether they could alter people’s perceptions of them without directly changing who they truly were. And whether that tweak in perception would in reality create an opportunity for them to improve their high school lives.

  Every member of the cafeteria fringe has something to offer. One only has to care deeply enough or look hard enough to find out what that is. I decided to write a book about quirk theory because too many students are neglected or disparaged due to qualities, interests, or skills that we should instead nurture and embrace. I issued the challenges to discover what happens when we do.

  BLUE, HAWAII | THE GAMER

  Blue had planned to go home after school, but he lingered after his last class, hoping to spot Jimmy. A pudgy fellow half-Korean, Jimmy was considerably taller than Blue, who was five foot five and muscled.

  Since the IM conversation in which Herman had offended him, Blue had withdrawn from his friends. Although he still liked Jackson, Ty, and Stewart, who sometimes joined him at the arcade, Blue took such pains to avoid Herman and his followers that he avoided the cafeteria altogether. This new distance was relaxing. “Sometimes,” Blue explained later, “you just have to log out, you know?”

  Instead, he spent lunch, recess, and before and after school killing time in the AP Government classroom. Sometimes he biked to school ninety minutes early to unwind there. The tiny classes (Blue’s class had nine students) left the large room always at least half-empty. The teacher, Ms. Collins, had created a welcoming lounge area with beanbag chairs. Blue was supposed to be her teaching assistant, but he had been wrangled into TA-ing autotech instead because of his expertise in the subject. He helped Ms. Collins with her computers anyway, fixing and improving them whenever he could.

  From a distance, Blue saw Jimmy enter the classroom, where a handful of students had congregated. Blue followed him, planning his strategy on the way. Kaloke’s “hallways” were sidewalks ringed with hibiscus, bird of paradise, and other tropical flowers whose scent drifted with the trade winds through tall open-air shutters into classrooms overlooking lush mountains. From some classrooms, students could see the horizon of the Pacific Ocean.

  Blue stood at his usual spot by the teacher’s desk for a few moments, fiddling with his iPhone. Then he called out, “Hey, Jimmy, I’m gonna sit with you.”

  “Okay!” Jimmy said, smiling.

  Blue grabbed a laptop from the classroom’s computer cart and slid into the chair next to Jimmy, where he pretended to do homework.

  A few desks away, four girls discussed AP classes and colleges. Blue stole glances at Jimmy, who gradually set his homework aside as he tuned in to the conversation. “Hopefully I can get into MIT,” he told Blue.

  “Why, what do you want to do?” Blue asked.

  “I want to work for NASA one day, or Boeing. But I want to work on the planes, not fly them.”

  Blue was intrigued. It was unusual for his friends to want to attend a prestigious mainland school. He had his heart set on Berkeley. “What’s it take to get into MIT?” Blue asked.

  “Good grades and all that stuff,” Jimmy said. “I might not have a chance, so I can just apply for fun, you know? And if I get in, I get in.”

  Blue told Jimmy he wanted to major in entrepreneurial studies at Berkeley.

  “I’m trying to get into Berkeley,” said a girl who had scored straight 5s on her AP exams.

  Another girl asked what her GPA was. “4.3,” she said. “What’s yours, Jimmy?”

  “4.0,” he said.

  The girl looked at Blue, who was finding this conversation more eye-opening than he’d expected. “I have a 2.6,” he said. Everyone in the room stared at him in amazement.

  “What?!” exclaimed one of the girls.

  “What?” Blue said. He knew what. He knew they assumed that smart geeks got good grades. And he had. He used to have a 3.9.

  “Nothing,” the girl stammered. “I just assumed . . . you were really . . . I don’t know.”

  “Let’s just say, some things happened,” Blue said casually. Meanwhile, his mind frantically compared GPAs, whizzing through statistics that hadn’t seemed meaningful until now. Jimmy is going to live out my dreams, he thought. The bubble of denial in which Blue had been placidly residing slumped suddenly as if to suffocate him.

  Blue was not going to get into Berkeley. He hadn’t realized until now that it was too late to restore his once-stellar GPA, which had tumbled precipitously last spring because of a host of issues that erupted at once. He had skipped AP Language, the traditional junior year AP English course, to take AP Literature because he was excited to analyze books. As the only junior in a class of seniors, he did well at first. But as the months went on, Blue realized that the analysis he expected wasn’t going to occur. The class had more nightly homework than any other class he’d taken. By second semester, unless Blue thought that an assignment would either teach him something valuable or challenge him, he didn’t do the work. Other than French and autotech, easy classes with few homework assignments, and Ms. Collins’ AP U.S. History class, which he aced, Blue barely managed Cs. He failed AP Lit.

  It might not have been coincidental that Blue’s grades dropped when he was pouring most of his energies into Arwing and practicing Call of Duty for gaming tournaments that would bring money and publicity to the club. But at the same time, Blue’s relationship with his mother had deteriorated. Blue had had family issues for as long as he could remember. On three separate occasions in elementary school, child services nearly put him in foster care because he had been left home alone so often. After his parents divorced when Blue was a toddler, his father moved to France, where Blue’s older brother now lived. Usually, Blue talked to his father only when his mother made him ask for money.

  Blue’s mother refused to pay for college, although she could afford to. Student loans were not an option, she said. If Blue could not find a way to attend college for free, then she would make him join the military. When she pressured him to buckle down academically, he gave up, unwilling to allow his mother to
take credit for motivating him when he couldn’t motivate himself. “So I always get off-track because it feels like I’d do things for nothing,” he said.

  Recently, while driving to the mall, Blue had told his mother that he wanted to go to Berkeley. She began another version of her usual lecture. “You have to start getting serious about school! Don’t expect a fucking dime out of me. I’ve been raising you eighteen years and I’m done with it already. I’m emailing your teachers every day asking for your work and grades and future assignments. And you have got to apply for every scholarship. And you need to consider the military. You like money, don’t you? These officers, they buy new BMWs in cash their first year!”

  Blue’s guidance counselor had inquired about his falling grades, and some of his teachers allowed him to make up work. While they were vaguely aware of his situation at home, Blue didn’t want to admit “I’m not doing my work to be rebellious. It seems immature. [I have] too much pride.”

  Nobody told him that he was ruining his chances of getting into Berkeley. Now, among some teachers, Blue had the reputation of a student who was going nowhere.

  Blue’s mom “had it all backwards,” Blue said, in assuming he didn’t care about the future. He thought about college constantly. And now he sat heavyhearted in the Government classroom, envisioning Jimmy leaving for MIT, achieving Blue’s goals. Throughout junior year, Blue had been convinced that he could “bounce back at any moment.” Now he knew his dreams were dashed.

  As Jimmy and the girls discussed scholarships, Blue noticed that periodically Jimmy looked at him and their eyes locked for longer than a typical glance. When conversation waned, Jimmy packed up to leave. Blue gazed after Jimmy until he disappeared from the doorway.

  WHITNEY, NEW YORK | THE POPULAR BITCH

  The preps started taking advantage of their seniority immediately. Knowing that teachers wouldn’t punish populars, they skipped classes and wandered the halls, parked in the school lot wherever (and however) they wanted to, walked upstairs before the security guards allowed students to do so, and sat on the heaters in some classrooms instead of at their desks.

  Before school one morning, a teacher asked Whitney to show two new girls to their first period class and help them adjust. Initially Whitney was annoyed, because new kids were usually outcasts. But as she chatted with the girls, she found them to be surprisingly cool. They were stylish, they seemed friendly, and they were twins, which scored them extra points. Whitney’s friends immediately allowed the twins at their lunch table because they “dressed cute” and carried Kate Spade purses.

  During the second week of school, Riverland held its senior class elections. As usual, the populars ran the meeting. They had monopolized the student council since seventh grade: Chip had always been the president, Giselle the vice president, Bianca the secretary, and Whitney the treasurer. Most of the other seniors, including the punks, didn’t bother to show up for elections anymore. The band kids, the wannabes, the FFAs, and a few “weirdos” were the only groups represented.

  The advisor called the meeting to order. “Do I have nominations for president?”

  “I nominate Chip,” said Bobby. The populars cheered and the teacher wrote Chip’s name on the board.

  A band kid nominated a fellow bandie, who laughed because he knew the nomination was a joke.

  “Okay,” the teacher continued, “next are nominations for vice president.”

  “I nominate Giselle,” Bianca said. The teacher wrote Giselle’s name on the board. When she asked if there were any other nominations, no one spoke.

  “Now, nominations for secretary,” the teacher said.

  “I nominate Shay,” a band kid said. Shay was the girl who had supposedly gained weight and frizz over the summer. The teacher wrote her name on the board.

  “I nominate Bianca,” said Giselle.

  Shay’s face fell. “Can I drop out?” she asked.

  “No, it’s too late,” the teacher replied.

  “Ugh,” Shay groaned.

  “Next, nominations for treasurer,” the teacher said.

  “I nominate Whitney,” Giselle said.

  Whitney laughed. “Haha, for the sixth year in a row!” she said. No one ever opposed her.

  Someone from the back of the room muttered, “Wow, hilarious,” under her breath. The teacher wrote Whitney’s name on the board.

  Then Jessica, an FFA, spoke up from the back of the room. “I nominate myself,” she said. The room hushed. Whitney’s jaw dropped as the teacher wrote Jessica’s name on the board. Someone was running against her? An FFA girl actually thought she had a chance?! The preps shot “How dare you” looks at Jessica until they left the room.

  Whitney was glad that her friends had her back. She was on shaky ground with Bianca these days because of Luke, her new best friend. Whitney had met Luke through mutual acquaintances after he graduated in June from another school. Whitney and Luke sensed a connection that they had never experienced with anyone else. Luke’s background fascinated Whitney; he had been a hard drug user until his little brother was born, which inspired him to quit. Luke made Whitney feel safe. He had street smarts and interesting stories. He also happened to be punk.

  That was all the preps needed to know. They told Whitney that Luke was a loser and a stoner. Actually Luke had been clean for four years while every one of Whitney’s popular friends smoked pot. Whitney had relatives who had been in rehab, so, after trying once and regretting it, she had promised herself she wouldn’t smoke. When the preps pressured her, she explained later, “since saying ‘no’ isn’t enough, I have to fake excuses like I have asthma, or I got arrested for it a while ago.”

  The populars were rude to Luke when Whitney brought him to their parties. At one gathering, a popular guy shouted, “Who brought the weirdo?” Besides his blue hair, Luke didn’t look that different; he was relatively short, with ripped abs and a baby-cute face. But the prep girls told Whitney bluntly not to bring Luke to future parties because “he wouldn’t be welcome.”

  Eventually, Whitney decided that if the preps didn’t allow Luke at their summer parties, then she wouldn’t go to them either. While her clique bonded without her, Whitney thought nothing of the temporary abandonment of her friends. All she wanted was to be with Luke, with whom she didn’t have to act fake. He encouraged her to be more of an individual and less judgmental. She accepted his plea not to do drugs, ever. Happier and starry-eyed, Whitney decided she was a new person. She wore bohemian clothes to reflect this change. She wanted to be different from everybody else.

  By the end of the summer, Whitney and Luke were spending most of their days together. When Whitney threw her end-of-summer party, she invited her new best friend, somehow expecting her group to understand. But the preps didn’t talk to him, glowered at him, and whispered to each other in front of him. They told Whitney they were angry she had spent the summer with him. Luke waited out the party inside, playing Rock Band with Whitney’s younger sisters. Whitney felt bad, but what could she do? Telling off her friends would only start the year with drama. Now that the summer was over, Whitney had to face reality. The populars would be at school with her. Luke would not.

  WHEN THE CANDIDATES DELIVERED their speeches, Chip and Giselle gave respectable talks. Bianca’s speech made no sense, which didn’t matter because Shay’s speech was, “I don’t want to be secretary. Vote for Bianca.”

  Whitney stood up. “So I’ve been your treasurer basically forever,” she said. “I know the ropes and all. Why break tradition?” She ad-libbed a few quick items and sat down.

  Then Jessica rose. Whitney had heard that Jessica had told classmates she was tired of the same students winning every year. Jessica apparently had rounded up other non-popular groups in an attempt to overthrow Whitney. She gave a long, detailed, polished speech that outlined her plans for the senior trip, graduation, and community service. Even Whitney had to admit that this FFA girl deserved to be a class officer.

  Whitney found ou
t at the end of second period that she had won for the sixth consecutive year. She acted blasé but secretly breathed a sigh of relief. She vowed to glare at Jessica whenever she spoke for the rest of the year.

  ______

  THE SECRET OF POPULARITY

  Some readers might wonder why, in a book about cafeteria fringe, I chose to follow someone who had a prime seat at the center table. Let me be clear: There are plenty of popular students who are friendly and gracious, just as there are outcasts who are not. Even the best-intentioned kids might make social blunders because they are still growing up. In Whitney’s case, as much as she espoused the benefits of popularity, she was conflicted. “I’ve never felt one hundred percent part of my group,” she admitted. She dealt with a double-edged sword. Because she sometimes acted like the bitch that the populars wanted her to be, she wasn’t fully embraced by other students. Because she sometimes revealed what she considered her true self, she wasn’t fully accepted by the rest of the popular clique.

  What does it mean to be popular? Sociologists report the common finding that students’ involvement in extracurricular activities can affect their popularity. For boys, participation on certain sports teams—basketball at some schools, football at others, etc.—automatically can make them popular. While this link also can be true for girls, there is an even more direct and exclusive route to popularity at many schools: cheerleading. Why? Although cheerleaders’ focus on appearance and membership in an elite group surely could contribute to their social status, the single most important factor that brings cheerleaders prestige is the same factor that lends some athletes popularity: They perform in front of large student audiences. Whether they are cheering at a game, bookending a pep rally, or wearing their uniforms in the halls, cheerleaders are easily identifiable. You can’t miss them. This feature forms a key part of popularity. Studies have shown that, at least among students, popularity equates with visibility.