Blog Post #1
Austin Johnson
03/10/2022
Blog Post #1
Student-Athletes are some of the hardest working people in school. Being a student-athlete is a daily struggle of trying to balance and set goals for yourself and your academic responsibilities. One of the keys to success is reminding yourself that you're not just an athlete, but also a student who is trying to graduate on time with a diploma. Student-athletes often fall into a trap of forgetting the student aspects and neglecting the study hours causing them to perform poorly in the classroom. It is an everyday battle with completing assignments and making sure your athletic skills are up to par. Athletics should be the top priority for students but sports are also important to them as well. Many student-athletes start to play sports at a young age, so continuing to play in college is the last chance to continue what they love.
To balance a schedule with both athletics and academics causes student-athletes to become overwhelmed with stress that can result in them falling behind in school. Of course, it is easy to say, “I am going to a schedule to manage my time between school, practice, games, tests, homework, and studying” but harder to implement these choices in a daily lifestyle. An example of when this mentality can become challenging is when you just finished an hour-long film session, then had a two-hour practice, and need to complete an hour’s worth of homework after. With these challenges also come rewards. Development from sports goes beyond learning new physical skills. Sport helps children develop better ways to cope with the highs and lows of life. When they’re playing sports, children learn to lose, being a good loser takes maturity and practice. Losing teaches children to bounce back from disappointment, cope with unpleasant experiences, and is an important part of becoming resilient. Playing sport helps individuals control their emotions and positively channel negative feelings. It also helps children to develop patience and understand that it can take a lot of practice to improve both their physical skills and what they do in school. Skills such as confidence, commitment, and patience are transferable into the classroom.
The decision to participate in sports can be looked at from many different ways like the perspective of the student-athlete, the coach, the teacher, or even the student who doesn’t play any sports. Yes you can expect that everyone want you to do well in school and athletics. However, teachers have deadlines they to meet which most of the time means students won’t be able to get positively channel negative feeling extension tests, homework, or classwork. Most teachers understand if you talk to them, but a lot of times you are overwhelmed with school and practices. Coaches want to win and the players want to too, but from the coaches’ perspective, they want you to be able to perform on the field or the court to the best of your ability so they will be leaned on you with the school. At least from my perspective, I have to focus on communication with my teachers for extension and making up tests. Additionally, I like having a calendar with my entire class schedule and all things I have to do on it. I have come to develop a life structured around athletics. Waking up, going to school, going to practice, eating dinner, then doing homework was my daily routine always. Then on the weekends, I would sleep in and then spend the afternoon outside playing a game or hanging out with my teammates. Even after my career as a student-athlete is over, continuing physical activity is going to be held at the same level of importance as it is now. Research shows physical activity contributes to improving the health of individuals who participate in sports activities. Sports help to improve cardiovascular fitness, hence vital in the management of body weight. The life skills learned through the hard work of athletics are transferable into the classroom. This has become exceptionally handy during test time. Participating in sports has given me useful problem-solving skills as well as giving me the confidence that I know could never be reinforced by academics. There is time I don't feel like getting up and going to early morning practices and weights or taking that extra mile when I feel like I can’t go another step. Sports have shown me the importance of making the right choices.
One of my first solutions for the problem of balancing a busy schedule between academic and athletic responsibilities is that teachers need to be willing to have flexible deadlines for assignments and offer make-up times for tests. A second solution for this problem is from the coaches’ perspective, coaches need to mandate all student-athletes to attend study groups a few times a week or assign tutors for athletes. A third solution to the problem of keeping a balanced schedule for the student-athlete is starting with the student-athletes and their accountability to communicate properly with their teachers and coaches. Communicating what times class and practices are at, and in the case that both academic and athlete obligations are scheduled for the same time of day, all parties are flexibles so the student-athletes schedule can be worked out properly.