Typical American High School
Filled with heteronormative teens
All kissing and a thousand corduroys
Trying to figure out what it all means
Typical American High School
Filled with heteronormative teens
All kissing and a thousand corduroys
Trying to figure out what it all means
Typical American High School
Tropes related to education in its many forms. Anything from brutal sadistic training to inspiring life-changing education. See also Skills and Training Tropes.
Also known as "I schooled your index."
Tropes:
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General/miscellaneous tropes
Media index:
Trope indexes:
Sub-indexes:
- Adults Are Useless: Even if a teacher is around, kids can still break school rules.
- Always in Class One: Works about or in a school usually take place in Class X-A or Class X-1.
- Asleep in Class: A student who usually falls asleep during class.
- Axes at School: A student brings a weapon to school and may or may not use it against someone.
- The Chain of Command: A part of administration involves knowing what one's duties are and what the limits are to their authority.
- Chekhov's Classroom: Someone learns something in school and unexpectedly applies that knowledge later in the story.
- Cute Sports Club Manager: A cute, athletic person who runs a sports club.
- Dean Bitterman: The principal of the school has it in for everyone there.
- Dodgeball Is Hell: In works of fiction, dodgeball will always be delightful for The Bully and despairing for the nerds and unpopular kids.
- Education Mama: A parent will get angry at their kid for not taking their studies seriously.
- Education Through Pyrotechnics: A lesson in science class often involves Stuff Blowing Up.
- E = MC Hammer: Incorrect or nonsensical equations that look like real math.
- Egg Sitting: Students are tasked with looking after eggs, bags of flour, or robots to determine whether they'd make responsible parents.
- Elite School Means Elite Brain: Smart characters go to famous universities.
- Everyone Went to School Together: The adult cast of a show turn out of have known each other for years and even went to the same school.
- Evil Principal: The principal is a villain.
- Experimented in College: A person who currently identifies as straight pursued same-sex relationships when they were in school.
- Fighting Back Is Wrong: When the nerd is punished for trying to fight back The Bully.
- Food Fight: A group of students in the cafeteria start throwing food at each other.
- Free the Frogs: Protesting against frogs being dissected in science class.
- Glasses Curiosity: Wanting to try on the glasses of others, which is quite common in grade school.
- Gym Class Hell: Works of fiction portray gym class as torturous, especially for unpopular kids and nerds.
- Gym Class Rope Climb: An activity in gym class that involves students having to climb up a rope hanging from the ceiling.
- Hands Go Down: The teacher asks a question: everyone raises their hands. The teacher asks a follow up question: everyone lowers their hands.
- Higher Education Is for Women: When a cast of characters graduate high school, it is more likely that the girls will to college.
- Homeschooled Kids: A character is taught and educated from home.
- Jock Dad, Nerd Son: A nerdy kid has a father who was a jock in school.
- Keep Away: A group of bullies take away someone's stuff and toss it around to each other to keep them from getting it back.
- Mooching Master: A teacher who holds their student in a debt and takes advantage of it for personal gain.
- Mysterious Teacher's Lounge: A group of students discuss what wonders could be hiding in the teacher's lounge.
- Nominated as a Prank: Student is nominated for Class President or Prom King or Queen as part of a malicious prank.
- Non-Giving-Up School Guy: A person who is determined to prevent children from skipping school.
- "Not Wearing Pants" Dream: A character dreams they are in a state of undress. These kinds of dreams often have the character dreaming they are naked or in their underwear while at school.
- Passing Notes in Class: A student passes a note to their crush while class is in session.
- The Permanent Record: A collection of a student's misdeeds.
- Persecuted Intellectuals: A person is feared, mistrusted, and persecuted because of their intelligence.
- Picked Last: A student is humiliated because they are the last one picked during gym class.
- Popular Is Dumb: A character who is popular in school is portrayed as unintelligent.
- Popular Is Evil: A character who is popular in school is portrayed as mean and ruthless.
- Prom Wrecker: A character tries to ruin the school dance.
- Putting the "Pal" in Principal: The school principal wants the students to see him as their friend.
- Save Our Students: A teacher tries to inspire a group of troubled students to do better in school.
- Schoolgirl Series: A Slice of Life series starring a group of female students.
- School Is for Losers: A person who believes that going to school is a waste of time.
- School Is Murder: A character tries to survive school because there are elements that are literally trying to kill them.
- Schoolyard Bully All Grown Up: The school bully is now an adult, but still a mean person.
- Stock Shoujo Bullying Tactics
- Stuffed into a Locker: A bully stuffs a kid into their locker.
- Stuffed into a Trashcan: A bully stuffs a kid into a trashcan.
- Subject101
- Swirlie: A bully sticks a kid's head in the toilet.
- Textbook Humor: Jokes in textbooks that you'd expect to keep a serious tone.
- Toast of Tardiness: A student who is late for school sticks a piece of toast in their mouth to eat for breakfast while they run.
- Trend Aesop: A character learns a lesson about trying to fit in with the crowd.
- Unconventional Electives 101: A course that covers a fringe topic.
- Wacky Fratboy Hijinx: A movie in which the humor comes from the antics of college fratboys.
- Wake Up, Go to School, Save the World: A Kid Hero has to juggle heroics and their personal life.
Schools and classes
- Absurdly Divided School: The school is divided into at least two viciously antagonistic groups.
- Absurdly Powerful School Jurisdiction: School officials attempt to punish a student for their actions outside of school grounds.
- Academy of Adventure: A school that is a Weirdness Magnet where adventures can occur.
- Academy of Evil: A school dedicated to training future villains.
- All-Ghouls School: A school for monsters.
- Artistic License – Education: When fiction depicts a real-life school system inaccurately.
- Assimilation Academy: A school that discourages creativity and crushes spirits.
- Boarding School: A school where students live on campus.
- Boarding School of Horrors: A boarding school that is horrible to the students.
- California University: A fictional university used by many High School TV shows to extend their lives into the college years.
- Class Pet: An animal that is kept in a classroom and cared for by the students.
- Clown School: A school where people go to learn comedy.
- College Is "High School, Part 2": A college that has all the high school stereotypes.
- College Radio: A radio station run by college students.
- Conveniently Seated: In a classroom, the main character will be sitting where it's convenient for the writer.
- Cool School: A school that has an amazing curriculum.
- Correspondence Course: A school that offers distant learning.
- Cram School: A school where you have to study reeeeeally hard to achieve certain goals.
- Daycare Nightmare: A daycare center with poor management and/or abusive caretakers.
- Detention Episode: An episode of the show where one of the characters gets detention.
- Dustbin School: A school where all the problem children go.
- Educational Short: A short, educational film is used for classroom instruction.
- Elaborate University High: A big fancy high school.
- Elevator School: A school has students from every grade in it.
- Extranormal Institute: A school with an abnormal setting.
- Foul Cafeteria Food: Public school lunch will make you lose your lunch.
- Getting Suspended Is Awesome: Students see out-of-school suspensions as cool because they don't have to go to school.
- The Good Old British Comp
- Hero Academy: A school that trains students specifically on how to be a hero.
- High School: The classic setting for secondary education, after elementary/middle school and before college/university.
- High School AU: An alternate continuity of a work where the characters are high school students.
- High-School Rejects: People you knew in high school are now working low-end jobs.
- High School Rocks: High school being shown as a fun place to be.
- Inner City School: A Sucky School where students do anything but learn.
- Junior High: Otherwise known as middle school, the place of education between elementary and high school.
- Middle School Is Miserable: Middle school is shown to be a cesspool.
- Locker Mail: Mail is delivered to someone's locker.
- Military School: A school which aims to instill military-style discipline in students.
- Old School Building: An old, spooky abandoned schoolhouse.
- One-Gender School: A school that either only admits female students, or only admits male students.
- Royal School: A school that teaches girls how to be princesses.
- School for Scheming: A school that is used as a cover for an elaborate plot-centric scheme.
- School of Hard Knocks: A school that allows students to fight each other.
- School of Seduction: A school that teaches prostitution.
- School Setting Simulation: A video game level taking place in a school, college, university, or other academic institution.
- Sensitivity Training: A school that sensitize people to their attitudes and behaviors that may unwittingly cause offense to others.
- Sex Miseducation Class: Sex ed classes are bad, useless, or incompetent.
- Sextra Credit: A student bribes their teacher into improving their grade by having sex with them.
- Shop Class: A high school course where students are taught industrial arts.
- Space Cadet Academy: The Sci-Fi equivalent of a Wizarding School.
- Spy School: A training program for spies or assassins
- Strawman U: A school stereotype that permits assumptions about the type of student the school will attract.
- Sucky School: A school that isn't very good at teaching.
- Summer School Sucks: A student has to attend summer school to catch up on missing credits.
- Two-Teacher School: Works set in schools that don't show more than two teachers.
- Wacky College: A college with strange faculty and students.
- Wacky Homeroom: A classroom with unique and quirky students.
- Wizarding School: A school where people learn magic.
Admissions, attendance and advancement
- Absentee Club Member: A character that is a member of a club or organization, but never actually attends its meetings.
- Animal Goes to School: An animal not normally seen in a school setting is in one.
- Artistic License – University Admissions
- Back to School: The story has a character having to attend school again.
- Compulsory School Age: Characters must attend school at the grade typical of their physical age, regardless of their mental age, knowledge, or maturity.
- Expelled from Every Other School: A character who can't go to school because they have gotten expelled so many times.
- First Day of School Episode: An episode where a character has their first day of school
- Freshman Fears: Students on their first year at a secondary or tertiary level of education usually have struggles at school.
- Gotta Pass the Class: A student is failing their classes and needs to get their grades up.
- Held Back in School: A student who is older than their classmates because they had to repeat at least one school year.
- Incomprehensible Entrance Exam: Getting into this school requires a test that makes no sense whatsoever.
- Ivy League for Everyone: Fictional characters have a much easier time getting into prestigious schools than real people.
- Late for School: A character is shown running to school because they overslept.
- "Last Day of School" Plot: An episode where a character has their last day of school
- New Year, Same Class: The classroom of the students and teacher from the previous grade are together in the new grade.
- Obsessed with Perfect Attendance: A character goes to extreme lengths to avoid being late or absent.
- Off to Boarding School: A villainous character plans to get rid of their new spouse's children by sending them to boarding school.
- School Grade Hacking: A student hacks the school's database to improve their grades.
- School of No Studying: A story that takes place in a school setting where no one is seen doing school work or worrying about their grades.
- Senior Year Struggles: Stress and angst about facing your future as a senior student.
- Shouldn't We Be In School Right Now?: It's pointed out that younger characters are cutting class when the plot clearly has them nowhere near school grounds.
- Skipping School: A student decides not to go to school and goes off to do something else instead.
Students
- All-Cheering All the Time: Cheerleaders speak as though they're cheering all the time, even in ordinary conversation.
- Alpha Bitch: A popular female student whose purpose is to be mean to the other characters.
- Academic Alpha Bitch: A female student who is skilled at academics and mean to other characters.
- Backstabbing the Alpha Bitch: The meanest girl is school is betrayed by a member of her own gang.
- Lovable Alpha Bitch: A mean female student who is really a nice girl deep down.
- Apathetic Student: A character does not care about school or grades in the slightest.
- Barbaric Bully: In fiction, bullies are big, dumb, and Obviously Evil.
- Beta Bitch: The Alpha Bitch's right-hand girl.
- Innocent Beta Bitch: A nicer or innocent Beta Bitch.
- Big Jerk on Campus: A popular male student whose purpose is to be mean to the other characters.
- Big Man on Campus: The high school version of The Ace, admired by everyone (or nearly everyone).
- Book Dumb: A character who isn't very smart when it comes to schoolwork, but is gifted in social intelligence.
- Book Smart: A character is shown as being very academically competent.
- Brilliant, but Lazy: It's shown that a student with bad grades is actually very smart, they just lack the motivation to do their schoolwork properly.
- The Bully: A student, or students, who picks on others.
- Bully Hunter: A character who hates bullies and is adept and eager to take them down.
- Bully Magnet: A character targeted and picked on by several bullies.
- Child Prodigy: A child who is highly intelligent for their age.
- Chuunibyou: A Junior High student who walks around acting like I Just Want to Be Special.
- Class Clown: The one kid in the class who has to be the center of attention.
- Class Princess: The most popular girl in school who is as sweet and nice as she is pretty and admired.
- Class Representative: The student who leads the class in following all the school activities.
- Cruel Cheerleader: Cheerleaders are portrayed as mean or vain.
- Delinquents: Students who are usually up to no good.
- Dork Horse Candidate: Someone utterly unsuited for the student council leadership runs for it and wins.
- Extracurricular Enthusiast: A student who's involved in loads of extracurricular activities.
- Foreign Exchange Student: An exotic new student introduced as a source of comedy and/or drama.
- Former Friend of Alpha Bitch: A character who used to be friends with the school's Alpha Bitch.
- Frat Bro: A college-aged male who loves drinking, partying, and sex.
- Grade Skipper: A student has skipped a grade or two because of their gifted intelligence.
- Go-Getter Girl: A young woman who strives to be perfect in every respect whether it be school or outside.
- Goth: Eccentric, moody oddballs who tend to wear dark clothes.
- High-School Hustler: The Mr. Fixit of high school.
- Huge Schoolgirl: A girl is unusually huge for her gender, and thus is self-conscious about her size.
- Japanese Delinquents
- Jerk Jock: An athletic guy who is also a jerk.
- Joshikousei: Japanese girls who wear Sailor Fuku.
- Kendo Team Captain
- Loser Team Mascot: Mascots of school sports teams at the bottom of the Popularity Food Chain.
- Lovable Jock: An athletic guy who is also a Nice Guy.
- New Transfer Student: A new student who is enrolling from another school.
- Ordinary High-School Student: A high school student who appears normal at the start of the series.
- The Quarterback: The effective captain of the school's football team who is usually nicer than his teammates.
- Second Year Protagonist: The lead character who is a sophomore in high school.
- Scholarship Student: A character who goes to a prestigious school on a scholarship.
- School Idol: The most popular student in school.
- Spoiled Sweet: The rich popular girl at school who is genuinely nice to everyone.
- Starving Student: The student from a poor background.
- Stereotypical Nerd: An unattractive (by physical features or styling), socially inept, and socially unpopular stock character with geeky interests.
- Stranger in a Strange School: An Ordinary High-School Student who winds up attending an Extranormal Institute.
- Student Council President: The Club President for the Absurdly Powerful Student Council, and the Class Representative for the whole school.
- Teacher's Pet: The student who kisses up to the teacher and rats on anyone trying to discreetly break the rules.
- Teacher's Unfavorite Student: A teacher really hates one particular student.
- Tiny Schoolboy: The smallest and youngest looking guy in class.
- Token Rich Student: The one student who belongs to a rich family.
- Tragic Dropout: A good student winds up having to drop out of school.
- Unknown Rival: Two students competing for the same goal without one of them even aware of the competition.
- Unconvincingly Unpopular Character: A student who is smart, funny, fashionable and good looking, but not popular.
Student relationships and cliques
- All Guys Want Cheerleaders: Male students are always interested in cheerleaders.
- All Guys Want Sorority Women: Male students are always interested in women who are part of a college sorority.
- Clique Tour: When a new student arrives, they (and the audience) are quickly introduced to the social groups of the school.
- Eating Lunch Alone: Students who eat lunch alone because they are new and haven't made friends yet or are social outcasts.
- Exclusive Clique Clubhouse: Cliques and other groups get their own unique housing.
- Gay Guy Seeks Popular Jock (frequently used as a High School trope)
- Girl Posse: The Alpha Bitch and her group of friends.
- High-School Sweethearts: A couple have been in love since they were in high school.
- Instant Fan Club: A character who is so awesome around school that they have a group of admirers.
- Make Way for the Princess: A scene where the Alpha Bitch walks in a school hallway full of students.
- New Kid Stigma: The new pupil at school is disliked by classmates.
- School Forced Us Together: Characters are forced together by the school system.
- Single Girl Seeks Most Popular Guy: An unpopular girl wants to date the most popular guy in school.
- Students Playing Matchmaker: Students try to pair their teachers with other people.
- Teacher/Parent Romance: A teacher falls in love with the parent of one of their students.
- Teacher/Student Romance: A student and their teacher fall in love.
School clubs and other organizations
- Absurdly Powerful Student Council: An organization of students run the school like a government.
- Club Stub: A new student tries to save a school club with a dangerously declined membership.
- Drama Club: A club with students who enjoy acting and put on plays.
- Japanese School Club
- School Clubs Are Serious Business
- School Newspaper News Hound: An absurdly elaborate school paper that makes school's news with true commercial values.
- Students' Secret Society: A secret society founded and run by students.
- School Club Front: A school club is actually a coverup for some extracurricular activity that is usually supernaturally-oriented.
School events
- Class Reunion: The graduating class of a school meet each other again at the school years later.
- Reunion Revenge: One of the former students takes the reunion as a chance to get back at the peers who wronged them.
- Class Trip: A class leaves school for a day out to an educational landmark or museum.
- Fundraiser Carnival: A school throws a carnival in order to help raise money.
- Graduate from the Story: The main cast of a school centered story are graduating.
- Graduation for Everyone: The whole cast of a show graduate school whether they were a good student or not.
- High-School Dance: A high school event where students ask each other to be their dates to the dance.
- Measuring Day: Students are given an annual physical examination.
- Picture Day: Students attempt to look nice the whole school day so they will look nice for their school photo.
- Prom Is for Straight Kids: LGBTQ students aren't allowed to attend prom, at least not as a same-sex couple.
- The Prom Plot: High school juniors and seniors attend their prom or an adult is a chaperone or date to a prom.
- Science Fair: A school event where students prepare science projects.
- School Festival: A school-wide event where all the clubs compete in various activities.
- School Play: Students put on a play, which is typically quite terrible.
- Show-and-Tell Antics: Students bring things to school for show and tell.
Schoolwork and grading
- Achievement Test of Destiny: A test that decides your future.
- The B Grade: A student gets upset over receiving a grade that is slightly less than perfect.
- Completely Off-Topic Report: A student is asked to write a report, but somehow writes the report on a subject that has nothing to do with the topic that was assigned.
- Deliberate Under-Performance: A student deliberately gets average or below-average grades.
- A Dog Ate My Homework: A student doesn't do their homework and claims their pet ate it to avoid getting in trouble for not doing it.
- Everybody Hates Mathematics: Mathematics is the one subject every student dreads having to do.
- Extremely Easy Exam: A comically easy exam that's almost impossible to fail, usually given by an apathetic or incompetent teacher.
- F--: A student manages to do so poorly that they receive a grade that goes way lower than what the education system would allow in real life.
- Homework Slave: Bullying someone else into doing your homework for you.
- Inept Aptitude Test: A student takes an aptitude test and doesn't get the result they wanted and/or expected.
- Last-Minute Project: A student fails to put in any work for their school project and turns in something they just made up or plagiarized.
- Nerds Love Tough Schoolwork: Nerds enjoy doing schoolwork that is difficult.
- The Parent-Produced Project: A student has their parent do their school project for them.
- Ridiculous Procrastinator: A character puts off doing a book report or other major project until mere minutes before it's due.
- Scantron Picture: Someone fills in the Scantron dots on their test to make a picture.
- Sleep Learning: A character uses Bedtime Brainwashing to help them study for an important event.
- Train Problem: A ridiculously hard math problem involving two trains.
Disciplinary techniques
- After-School Cleaning Duty: Students stay after school to clean the classroom.
- Chucking Chalk: A teacher throws a piece of chalk at their misbehaving students.
- Corporal Punishment: A teacher inflicts physical pain on a student as a form of punishment.
- Dunce Cap: A student is made to sit in the corner while wearing a pointy cap as punishment for misbehaving and/or getting an answer wrong.
- Good Behavior Points: Students are given or taken away points for showing either favorable or poor behavior.
- Nails on a Blackboard: Someone runs their nails across a chalkboard.
- Standing in the Hall: A student is made to stand in the hall as punishment.
- Writing Lines: A student is punished by having to write a sentence promising they'll never do what they did wrong again a large amount of times.
School uniforms and related apparel
- Anti-School Uniforms Plot: A school tries to implement school uniforms and the students try to protest.
- Casual Sports Jersey: A character (often a Jerk Jock) wears a sports team uniform outside of a sports environment.
- Catholic Schoolgirls Rule: A girl wears a catholic school uniform even when not attending a catholic school.
- No Dress Code: A work has students get away with wearing clothes that would get them into trouble in real life.
- Red Armband of Leadership: A student wears a red armband to show they are in charge of a club or group.
- Sailor Fuku: A girl who wears a sailor suit.
- School Sport Uniform: A uniform worn by students on the school sports teams.
- School Swimsuit: swimsuits that are given to students on the school swim team.
- School Uniforms are the New Black: A student who wears their school uniform even when they aren't attending school.
- Sudden School Uniform: A school suddenly starts forcing its students to wear a school uniform.
- Transfer Student Uniforms: A New Transfer Student who wears a school uniform from their old school.
- Yellow Sash of Power: A student given the job as hall monitor lets the authority and power go to their head.
Degrees
- A Degree in Useless: A college degree in a subject that is worthless.
- Geniuses Have Multiple PhDs: Fictional geniuses get more than one PhD to prove they're an expert, even though this wouldn't be necessary in real life.
- I Minored in Tropology: A character reveals that they are educated in a field or subject that is unexpected for them.
- MRS Degree: A woman who goes to college to find a husband.
- Phony Degree: A person has a degree for something they didn't earn.
- Worthless Foreign Degree: A person from a foreign country gets a mediocre job rather than a job they are qualified for.
Martial arts or military training
- Boxing Lesson: A student who is bullied decides to take up boxing.
- Deadly Graduation: A character in an evil training program must battle their friend to the death as a final test.
- Heir to the Dojo: A high school student is heir to a martial arts family.
- Hero Academy: A school that trains people to develop the skills and knowledge needed to be able to do heroic deeds.
- Superhero School: An institute that teaches young superheroes how to use their powers properly.
- Military Academy: A school where a military officer learns his or her trade.
- Ninja School: A school where you learn how to be a ninja.
- Pacifist Dojo: A martial arts school that teaches its pupils to exercise restraint and only fight defensively.
- Rival Dojos: When 2 or more different fighting schools are enemies with each other.
- The Spartan Way: Training from Hell meant to create a Badass Army.
- Thug Dojo: A martial arts school that teaches its pupils to start fights and beat up people at whim.
- Training "Accident": A character undergoes special training only for something to go horribly wrong.
- Training from Hell: Characters go through extremely tough training.
- Training the Peaceful Villagers: The Hero trains a local village to fight back against an advancing army.
- Ultimate Final Exam: Students must complete a dangerous final test before graduating.
- Wax On, Wax Off: A character undergoes special training through menial work.
