Why is academics important in sports

However, unless it is a sport forced on the student by well-meaning parents or other adults, studies show the benefits of sports on student athletes are greatly beneficial to the overall well-being of the student. Students who played sports exhibited either improved academic scores, or they maintained their current level of academic grading. Overall, studies show that students who play sports do not allow their commitment to their team to affect their commitment to their education.

As mentioned, grades often improve for the student athlete. Another benefit to playing high school sports is that athletes also tend to have increased self-confidence which can be beneficial both on and off the field. Being on a sports team is not easy and requires enormous amounts of determination and preparation in the off season to prepare for the physical and mental challenges they will face during their sports season.

A benefit to building and maintaining physical fitness, students often feel more mentally fit and more confident about themselves. This can then lead to an overall boost in confidence in the way one speaks and acts around others, including peers, teachers, and other adults. It is not uncommon for freshmen to find friendships with upper-level classmen. From my own personal experience, I became friends with seniors when I was a freshman. I still talk to those people and consider them friends.

Currently, I am a senior, and now have the opportunity to become friends with freshmen that I may not have met or had the privilege to get to know. It also allows for the strengthening of existing relationships. Forming and strengthening friendships is just one of the many perks of playing on sports teams.

Furthermore, this provides an opportunity for enhanced feedback from academics to coaches regarding the attitude, behavior, and leadership-skills of the student athletes when in an academic setting.

The Scholar-Athlete Camps offer but one example of many academic support-oriented initiatives that can be established at universities across the nation to assist Scholar-Athletes. Scholar-Athletes have the potential to be physically, intellectually and emotionally committed to high-level achievement in both their academic and sport endeavors. Their success requires development of an integrated skill-set that includes teamwork, a strong work ethic, commitment, leadership, time management, and physical and emotional health.

A nationwide paradigm shift is urgently needed to recognize and tap into these skills, which are the same skills required to succeed in all professions from science to the humanities. Another important result of this Scholar-Athlete grass root initiative will be to revolutionize the content and efficacy of the recruiting process that will validate their personal interests both athletics and academics.

A Scholar-Athlete is someone who is committed to improving themselves while participating in sport. Moving forward, the words Scholar and Athlete could much more effectively be viewed as equivalent, respected and well-understood terms to describe an active person who is holistically engaged in advancing their personal and professional future.

This innovative yet practical mindset for the Scholar-Athlete, which currently is absent in many sectors of our society, will invoke powerful and effective change now and for future generations. All authors listed have made a substantial, direct and intellectual contribution to the work, and approved it for publication.

Support was also provided by the Carl R. The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest. We also deeply appreciate the strong support and collaboration with the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign varsity coaching staff.

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Smith, R. Student athletes should be relieved to learn that, according to researchers at the Brown Center on Education Policy, a commitment to school sports does not have to translate into compromised academic performance.

The academic performance involves factors such as the intellectual level, personality, motivation, skills, interests, study habits, self-esteem or the teacher-student relationship. Among the benefits of distance education for school-age children are increases in enrollment or time in school as education programs reach underserved regions, broader educational opportunity for students who are unable to attend traditional schools, access to resources and instructors not locally available, and ….

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