Should sports, such as football and basketball continue in college and high schools in the U.S.?

Question

I am not questioning the value of competition and athletic studies. Both are valuable and should be continued. However high school sports has become the farm league for college football and college football is the farm league for the N-F-L. Most of the costs are born by taxpayers, alumni associations or booster clubs.

Should professional sports leagues finance these farm leagues and should they or should they not continue to be part of public and higher education?

Most of the physical facilities, such as fields and gymnasiums, are taxpayer funded. Some schools may make a large enough gate to fund part of the sports, but most have to use booster clubs or fund-raising activities to help buy uniforms, helmets, etc. It's a good community activity, but should gyms and football fields be built at the expense of science labs and classrooms?

Women's sports are probably closer to what the initial purposes of school athletics were intended to be, and I don't support defunding sports for either men or women.

I am questioning priorities and especially funding priorities. I know of colleges and universities that have dropped all NCAA sports so they could concentrate on academics. An extreme measure, and not necessarily one I would favor, but it is food for thought.

I should point out that I've done a little research on this subject. I've attended school board meetings, and I have a lot of friends who are coaches or otherwise engaged in sports.

I like sports. I have five sons, three of whom were in high school athletics. I think there are a lot of good things that come out of athletics. However I have also seen athletic programs, such as women's basketball and soccer, that had to struggle for a fraction of the funding that football gets.

For the record I would like to see high school sports continue, but I wonder if we could rearrange our priorities to make it closer to what was intended. More kids should play. Facilties should be more geared to education than competition. There should be more sports represented and funding should be more equitable.

Football and basketball should definitely stay, but kids also need academic coaching, and that should be top priority. Too many times I've seen AD's make more than assistant principals

Final point: We Americans tend to go in too much for spectator sports and not enough for the kind we participate in. I think softball leagues are an admirable exception to this, but they aren't usually school programs--which is good because adults need them at least as much as kids.

Sports was never intended to be an excuse to sit on an overstuffed chair swilling down beers and getting overstuffed ourselves on chips and dips.

It was intended for participation. I may be naive, but I would like to see more emphasis on this. We need to slim down, get in better shape and learn how to have fun doing physical stuff.

I've known too many high school football stars who were overweight diabetics in middle age. We need life sports.

How can high schools and colleges better promote these?

Answer 1

The problem is that we the public care so much about sports and in some cases put the fiat of your favorite team above much more important events in our lives or in the world. I coach at the high school level and I need to give my self reality checks very often. The reason colleges and the pros can do these things is because we the fans allow them to and force them to do whatever they can do to win. If they win they get money and to win you need a good coach and facilities which means you need to raise ticket prices to pay for all this stuff. Once you have it you better win or you will be fired so that person does everything they can to build a winner. This steam all the way down to youth leagues where parents are coaching a sport which should be about fun but are now all about winning. Sports need to stay in high schools and the coaches should be examples of education first athletics second. To often this is not the case. The fans also need to look at this and stop demanding perfection from their coach, their kids, and their teammates during games. We are the ones (the public) who have made it this way.

Answer 2

Highschool definatly. Obesity. Thats that answer.

College is a little more difficuilt. Goign to PSU right now, it really sux to see your team lose while you pay for tickets knowing these guys are goign to school for free with B.S. majors.

At the same time, people want it. For example, P.S.U. is a football school so they put more money towards it. Other schools, the focus isn't on the football even though they have a team and less money is put towards it there.

Its also an oppertunity for some people without the financial resources that do have a talent in athletics to get a college education. Regardless of genes, top atheletes still need to work hard to get where they are and i don't see a problem with giving them an oppertunity. They definatly do have the drive to succeed in life.

All though i would love it if it went back to the days where only the rich went to school :-)

Answer 3

They should absolutely be continued. You should do some research on the subject. The NFL has many programs for youth football. At the high school level, parent take care of a lot of the cost, and at the college level, much money is made from high profile sports.

Answer 4

well this is a very sore subject for me because I think we as a society put way more into sports than we do grades. Esc. here in Okalhoma. I mean there is something wrong when a kid can make a 60 in all classess and still play football. We need to make sports be a privledge and not a right. To many kids think they are going to make it on sports alone and never rely on grades. Parents put more into their kids doing well in football and basketball than they do in how their kids grades are. My son does not play any sport unless he makes all 70's and above. I think the money being thrown out their is way to much. Esc. when some dude is given 51 MILLION dollars just to get to talk to him... Tell me how that is even justifiable? I mena I think it is great fot the guy who got the 51 million, wish he would just give me 1 million of it. HAHA pocket change to him though. Someone pay me a million and I will talk to you.

Answer 5

Another way of coming at this question might be: "since it's not feasible to get rid of athletics in high schools and colleges, how can we better manage them so that sport, not business, is emphasized?" School sports are here to stay...for good or for ill. The challenge is to make them a force for good.

Answer 6

less that one tenth of one percent of high school football players go on to the NFL. probably less than one percent even go on to play in college. basketball and football teams in schools are by no means "farm league" for professional sports. they're passtimes and exercise for students, and they should be looked at that way.
you could make the argument that they should be cut because they cost too much and take away focus from the academic aspect of high school or college, but i don't think that's a legitimate reason to scrap them. teams can bring a school together, and i think more students enroll because of them.

Answer 7

I agree with Desi guy. Most well educated and well off families would prefer their daughters to marry within their own culture. There is also a trend in the US that white and sometimes even black Americans prefer marrying Asian Women. Some like Asian-American Women because they are not feminist contrary to their Anglo Saxon counterparts. And contrary to what one person mentioned here, not all Asians marry for money. Some Asian Nations are actually far wealthier than Americans, take for instance, the Japanese. Singaporeans, Koreans, Malaysians, in general enjoy a very good standard of living. So please cut the stereotype, people. As for Asian Girls living and raised in Asia, the thing is that, I have seen this personally, in Vietnam, Cambodia, Philippines, and Thailand. They flock to white guys, like bees to a flower, even if he is unattractive (for European Standards). Some Asian Girls are very smart and they don't care even if a guy is white, black or whatever, and would rather date a decent guy like you than a middle aged, overweight white guy. :))) I don't think you should choose your woman or girlfriend according to her race. You should keep your mind open. For all you know, the right girl might just be around the corner and you ignore her, simply because she is not from the "right race".

Answer 8

No - besides your point is wrong that tax payers or paying the bill in college for football and basketball that usually pay for themselves. If your point of view is purely economic then you would eliminate the women's sports programs - that will not sit well politically.

Good Luck!!!

Answer 9

I remember once seeing the percentage of high school players who played in college even if they went to school many did not.
And the percentage of college graduates who finish carreers or even begin them in the NFL or NBA are suprisingly small. so why should the pro leagues have to pay for all the people who will never play for them.