The Pros And Cons Of High School Athletes

While certain schools find it difficult to balance sports and academics, numerous schools across America found a way to perfectly balance the two, proving that sports can be an integral part of one’s scholastic experience. Professors Angela Lumpkin and Judy Favor conducted a study of the performance of high school athletes and non-athletes in Kansas in the 2008-2009 academic school year. Overall, they found that high school athletes earned higher grades, graduated at a higher rate, dropped out of school less frequently, and scored higher on state assessments than non-athletes, which proves that one’s participation in sports does not negatively affect one’s performance in the schoolroom. 9,347 athletes and 9,221 non-athletes reported their GPAs …show more content…
With this information present, athletes are outperforming their classmates in terms of turning in homework assignments, doing classwork, and taking quizzes and tests. Among the 17,249 non-athletes who had available data, 88.1% graduated with 2,323 failing to graduate. Among the 12,218 athletes, 97.6% graduated and only 303 failed to graduate (Lumpkin and Favor 48). Among non-athletes, 2.9% of males dropped out while 2.2% of females dropped out, and among athletes only .26% of males dropped out while .13% of females dropped out. Seemingly, coaches motivate their athletes to perform well in the classroom, since they realize that these players will have lives to live after they have left the team. On Kansas State assessment tests between 2006 and 2009, athletes had a higher mean average score than non-athletes in all categories. With this information, athletes achieve in the classroom at a higher rate than non-athletes in …show more content…
Tu Price (2013) reveals that the average GPA of non-athletes is 2.72 while the average GPA of athletes is 3.01. This information comes with a reality of athletes generally receiving less time to study than non-athletes, since a lot of their time is focused on preparing for their competitions, games, events, etc. These statistics reveal that athletes around the country generally perform better than non-athletes academically. This also presents a realization that a slew of factors need to be examined in the case of education since athletics is clearly not affecting one’s education. American high school athletes outperforming their non-athletic peers completely disproves any argument that proponents of abolishing sports have. One of the main reasons for athletes outperforming non-athletes academically is that athletes have a large support system from their coaching staffs to ensure that they are doing well in school, and they have high standards set against them. Having high standards helps student athletes develop discipline, and Windsor High School in Windsor, Connecticut is a school which sets the bar high for its