Quote Originally Posted by capecoddah View Post
They are"smarter" because they were serious about school. Math.
Two things
1. If you see a Russian student in the US on J-1 then most likely that student stands out from the crowd. He/she either really smart and got scholarship to go to the US or his/her parents are rich (I doubt that you gonna see the second kind at the motel)

2. Russian school system is yet stays analytic (thank God) comparing to the US school system. That means there are not a lot of tests where you supposed to pick the right answer from a few. There are tests which have no pre-defined answer, you need to use you brain to analyze and find/calculate the correct answer yourself using your knowledge. It is harder on teachers but it benefits the kids a lot. It develops creativity and analytic thinking. However Russian school system lacks home projects (like building the Solar system model from bunch of scrap) which you can find in the US

Very interesting reading about the topic
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/18/ma...pagewanted=all