A dark cloud on the horizon of high school athletics. This year New Mexico’s budget is coming up hundreds of millions of dollars short on revenues ,and the state’s trough from which public education feeds may not have the funds to satisfy the appetite of all its school districts.
Athletics is one area where schools could be looking to cut costs. This would be shame because, somehow, sports and academics have become two separate entities. Why else would they be referred to as “extracurricular?”
Sports should not be considered “extra.” They can and should be part of the total package of education, particularly public education. It is wrong to think of athletics and academics as two different things, because the two are compatible. Athletics should be integrated into academics more fully than they are now and be used as a tool toward more learning and understanding.
Take baseball. A lot of people hear about ERA (earned run average) but how many people know how this statistic is formulated? What if one of the exercises in a math class was to have students learn how to figure it out? Once they know the formula and process, you could take it one step further into algebra. If a pitcher has an ERA of 3.39 and has given up 56 runs, how many innings has he pitched? I feel more children would be interested in math and be proficient in it if it was taught in the context of subjects that are familiar to them, such as athletics.
Athletics are also a way to see the evolution of society. For example, how many students today know the story of Jackie Robinson. People seem to have forgotten how momentous the integration of baseball was.
In these tough economic times, it would be interesting to have students examine the role money plays in sports. For example, they could figure out how many dollars it took to build the Dallas Cowboys new stadium and where that money come from.
Sports is not a separate entity from our society, but for better or worse, one of the most integral parts of it.
The key to education is stimulating learning. Athletics can be the stimulation for a student who would otherwise fall asleep during a math lesson or be bored with economics.
Which brings us to the importance of sports, and it has nothing to do with winning and losing. Not all teams can be winners, but the lessons of teamwork, discipline and friendship that are learned by participating in sports can last a lifetime.
It would be a shame if there were students in the coming years who couldn’t have the opportunity to learn these lessons.