I will be raising some differences and some similarities between college athletics and professional athletics and show how each pertains to social and individual obligations. I would like to first talk about some advantages of being a college athlete.…
Throughout my four years as an Amos Alonzo Stagg student-athlete, not only have I enjoyed every minute of playing, but I have learned from it as well. Some of these traits that have been given to me due to being involved in extracurriculars have improved my personal development and can prove to be useful in the future whether it be at college or the workplace. Some of these include working well with others, time management, and will to want to be better.…
Robert Robinson, a thirty year old social worker at a home for troubled youth, has lived a difficult life and overcome many obstacles to get where he is. Raised in a lower income community in Miramar, FL., the concept of college was a faraway dream. In high school his main focus was to play football. He said “2 years of hard work and my grades were good enough to play, finally.” Robert’s goals were to complete high school, go to a 4year college, and go onto D1 football then the NFL. Robert experienced many struggles on his way to college. He underestimated his educational capabilities not knowing what he wanted to do, or if he could get good enough scores to make his dreams come true.…
The fear of losing everything Craig Nasvik worked for, was the hardest part of his college experience. “It was the feeling of not being in charge,” Craig says, recalling back to his sophomore year when he blew out his right knee. The factor that led him to believe he could never play football again, and miss some of the most important years of his life. Craig attended the University of Minnesota Duluth on a full ride athletic scholarship. He was recruited out of the state of Wisconsin, where he was born and raised. It was the neighborhood that he grew up in, that gave him the competitive nature. Craig described his friends to the movie ‘Sandlot’. They were always outside, picking teams and playing different games.…
Richard L. Worsnop offers multiple different points about high school sports and athletes. Concerns about the oppression of young athletes and debating if high school athletics “builds character”, are some of the main issues pointed out. Some coaches believe interscholastic sports competitions teach everything about character and teamwork, while others believe overemphasizing a win can teach the growth of negative character traits. Meanwhile, there are no doubts that certain drugs can enhance an athlete’s performance, but this can lead to injury and other harmful effects. High school athletes are sometimes considered, “dumb jocks”, which leads to the question if student athletes should maintain a certain grade-point average. Some players think…
Most effectively shared as a case in point, Gerald Graff offers his own adolescent experiences and love for sports over schoolwork that developed an intellectual skill outside the area of formal education.…
As a result school administrators and educators are notified which student athletes possess a concern towards academics. Further analysis can lead to intervention programs and assistance from the schools towards the individuals who are at risk with the imbalance of motivation.…
For many college athletes, the lure of playing pro sports is intoxicating. Dreams of fancy cars, luxurious homes, tailor-made suits, voluptuous women, and the mental images of a crowded stadium chanting their name is enough for any collegiate athlete to think about abandoning their education for a chance at stardom. When the dreams are solidified with million dollar contracts, think immediately is replaced by impulse. Left behind in the frenzy is the much needed college education that no one seems to care about any more. An athletes only hope is to complete a college education first for what life's lessons has to offer later when hard-knocks is the final exam.…
is a typical day in the life of a student athlete, faced with several struggles during…
Sometimes a student-athlete doesn’t properly acknowledge their schedule and put forward one over the other, allowing the forgotten one to deteriorate over time. Education is left behind while athletes apply all their energy into sports -- main point for attending a college is to obtain an education. They’d rather hit the gym than the books, they have always been told that they are talented enough to go far, but never that education will further their goals in life. In this statement, “Mary Willingham’s stunning charges that 60 percent of the University of North Carolina’s (UNC) football and basketball players read below the 8th grade level” (Power 1). Willingham is a researcher for the University of North Carolina, she illustrates students mentality as unfocused on their studies. Enabling student-athletes to receive paychecks will only increase the percentage as they now believe that their sport has turned into a job, when money starts hitting their bank accounts they will forget about school. If since from the gecko, students are given the idea that they don't have to pay attention in school to be successful, then they will never know what to do when an injury occurs ending their career. An education should prepare you for the real world by understanding how to handle your money, problems that pro’s…
Eat. Go to school. Go to practice. Go home. Do homework. Eat. Sleep. Repeat. With playing sports all year round, it never ends, and student athletes are all very familiar with the word ‘stress’”, quotes Sami Von Gober, a three-sport superstar with a superb grade point average, who knows firsthand the difficulties of dealing with everything a teenage athlete has to handle. Although athletics and staying active are necessary in certain children’s lives, overdoing sports and exercise can lead to serious complications. Many athletes have heard it before; “School comes first”, “Homework before sports”, and “If you are too stressed out, you can miss a practice.” But with the threat of missing a game if one misses a practice, or extra conditioning drills if a player is late, many young athletes would choose to dismiss a homework assignment rather than miss an extra hour of athletic coaching to help them excel in their sport. Student athletes have a loss of focus in classes due to thinking about their sport. Will they start the next game? How does that one play go again? Is practice going to be hard tonight? These are the kinds of questions running through an athlete’s head while they should be focusing on math equations or science vocabulary. Another problem that is increasing in young athletes is sleep deprivation, which can be hazardous to a child’s health, ability to play their sport correctly, and attentiveness in class. Lack of sleep can lead to hallucinations,…
High school is a period of wonder, excitement, and mystery, where a teen’s first taste of freedom guides them on their journey. On the contrary, it is a time of social pressure and anxiety, where fitting in with “the crowd” is what looms on every young boy’s mind. This was me as a sophomore, trying to fit into the archetype of the athlete; the student who could clock a 6 minute mile or just hit a jump shot. I would mirror their actions, trying to force myself to copy certain qualities, like music and things that they enjoyed. But alas, my 5’8 height, 130lb body weight, and scrawny body frame questioned my ability to perform like a top athlete. Even so, I conformed myself to the social norm of what I thought was cool, allowing peer pressure to get the best of me.…
The reason why I chose this article was because many athletes don’t have the time…
The NCAA consist of forty-two hundred thousand athletes. Many of these athletes have been training for most of their lives to be able to play in college. Athletes dedicate their life to the sport have no time for anything else. I have trained with the most advanced volleyball clubs and volleyball specific personal training. Coming into college I would expect the same or more intensity then I was trained with, but I was surprised by a lot of things that were done wrong.…
Winning is an important part of sports in general. Teams and individuals think about what it will take in order to win and then they go after what is required to succeed. In the article “Are High School Sports Good for Kid?” it says “we found that these individuals were highly successful (winning over 70% of their games). They stressed winning, but never put winning before the personal and educational development of their players. Instead, they maintained a strong educational philosophy and did not just talk about building character in their players, but took daily actions to do so while at the same time pursuing excellence.” This shows how school sports push kids toward achieving what they strive for in all aspects. With school sports children can set…