I gotta agree, I clicked so damn well with the kids in any "gifted" program I ever partook in. Some of them were super socially-awkward, but I didn't care because they were super smart and loved to discuss super complex, deep subjects, at length. I learned from them and they learned from me. This just simply didn't happen in any normal school setting, whatsoever. Unfortunately all of those experiences were indeed outside of school, extracurricular stuff. If actual normal school had been like that, I may have actually liked school!