A new study suggests students who excel in high school sometimes find life, post-diploma, disturbingly challenging.

The study found 20 percent of highachieving high-schoolers were not meeting personal goals by the time they reached 26. They still did a little better than the average high-school graduate, of whom 29 percent were not financially independent by age 26, surprising researchers.

“What’s scary is it’s unpredictable,” says John Schulenberg, a professor of developmental psychology at the University of Michigan. “We used to think if things were going well in high school, they’d continue to go well.”

On the up side, high-school underachievers sometimes thrived once they claimed their bit of sheepskin. Go figure. (Psychology Today)

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