“Sports are the only thing that matters in life”. This is how many students feel right now about their athletic activities, and sadly this sometimes feels true for everyone. However, people should not let how they perform athletically define them as a person. It is hard to believe that more of the school funding is actually going to sports instead of education. This needs to stop.

Many devoted athletes spend a frequent amount of  their week playing sports. As pressure mounts and when expectations aren’t met, it can leave athletes feeling like a major disappointment. For some people heavily involved in sports, it can feel like that is the only thing that matters. 

Alex McDonald, a junior at A-West, says, “I practiced three and a half to four hours a day of tennis.” 

With no rest, Mcdonald had to practice long hours everyday. For many students the stress can mount. It is important to remember to keep sports in perspective. Sure they help acquire team building skills and have many positives but they can also overtake a person’s life. It is important to find a balance between focusing on school, social life, and sports. 

Ana Felce, a writer from Azusa Pacific University says, “You don’t want to exhaust yourself by spending all your time either in class or at practice. If you study smart and use your time wisely, you can successfully balance academics, athletics, and social events.”

Students need to prioritize what is important in their lives. In most cases school and having a social life should be number one.

According to the NCAA, approximately 480,000 of the nearly 8 million graduating high school athletes will go on to compete in college. This means playing at the next level will be a difficult task for most high school athletes to achieve. If academics are at the forefront of people’s lives then kids will be more prepared for college and beyond, rather than focusing all of their energy on a sport. If students don’t play a sport in college, colleges are not going to care about how well or how long they played sports in high school.

It is also important to note that no one should find their self worth from sports alone. It is hard not to get caught up in all of the hype and popularity our culture puts on athletics. America has NBA players on the cover of magazines, while pro sports athletes are making millions of dollars. However, everyone has value regardless of what they participate in. According to ThriveGlobal, friends, family, and relationships are what matter most in life and determine who you are as a person. Not how good you are at a sport.

Not only does our culture need to keep sports into perspective, but it is also important as a society to recognize that more of school funding needs to go to education instead of sports. 

Davic Conn, a writer for the Guardian says, “The spending on sports is typically three times more than the spending on education.” 

This just shouldn’t be happening. It is funny to think that we live in a society where a game has more monetary value than our future. If you take a step back, sports are truly just a game, and for the most part don’t directly impact everyday people. On the other hand, education has a big role in our country’s future and it will determine how we advance for years to come. Education could take bounds and leaps with more funding. Graduation rates would go up and teachers would become more involved because they would be making more. Don’t get me wrong, I love watching a good sports game and have a passion for sports. But I don’t think a football game should hold more value than a good education.

Mcdonald further explains, “It’s important to fund education because it funds the future and if our children aren’t educated they can’t be successful.” 

Unless you are a relative to Michael Jordan, you should be worried about the future of your children from an education standpoint rather than an athletic standpoint.

The hope is that more and more of us will realize how important education truly is. In the end I think we as students can find joy in sports but also can realize that sports are not what will ultimately define us in life. Instead it will be how we carry ourselves and treat others.