I saw the same thing in college, but I narrowed it down not to intelligence, but aptitude for abstract vs concrete thought. In high school everyone either stru

I saw the same thing in college, but I narrowed it down not to intelligence, but aptitude for abstract vs concrete thought. In high school everyone either struggles with geometry or algebra, while finding the other relatively accessible. College magnifies this effect. I intensely struggled with calculus, far and away my hardest subject. Friends those raw intelligence was similar to my own found calculus to be laughably easy - I complained about how poorly our textbook explained new concepts, and my friends praised exactly the traits I criticized. I also found that some people had to learn computer science bottom-up, while others (like myself) had to learn top-down. Some friends couldn't get comfortable with high-level concepts until they understood how every piece worked, down to the metal, while I couldn't wrap my head around the low-level concepts until I understood how they fit into the big picture of problem solving. I've seen this pattern repeat again and again during and after college. And it doesn't help that the people who like teaching abstract subjects are the people who never found those subjects a struggle.