Will CHS ever give athletes time to rest? (Editorial)
Athletes should be allowed to replace gym class with a study hall.
Every student in CHS is required to take a gym class twice a week. Yet athletes are included in gym when they do “gym class” every day after school. They’re already overachievers; I feel they should have a choice between gym class and study hall to replace their gym class.
According to the gym teachers, the purpose of gym class is to get part of the 60 minutes a day into action. Athletes work out for more than 3 hours after school and weekends.
11th grade football player, Paul Syverson stated, “I almost failed last year because there was no time for homework.”
Every athlete that plays a school sport gives up enough of their time to try and get connected into school spirit. It’s very important in high school for teenagers to get involved in other extracurricular activities. But with all of that spare time, they choose to practice and play games for the school.
11th grade cross country runner Hailey West said, “I got home at like 7:30 last night; I didn’t have time to do any of my homework that was due today.”
Why can’t CHS take a moment to appreciate the students who play sports to support the school and make it easier for these athletic students to come to school less stressed?
Athletes shouldn’t have to do gym, and in replacement, they should have all study halls. These hard-working students come home tired and exhausted, and it’s hard to concentrate on studying for their tests when all the students want to do is doze off into a deep sleep and do the same thing all over again the next day. As much as athletes love to be mentioned on the announcements in the morning at CHS, they can’t spend their whole school day trying to not get another F.
More time should be given to athletes so they can get they can come home without wondering how much time they’re going to have to study for their big test tomorrow. Let’s give these athletes a round of applause for doing what they do. Because that next F might keep them from doing what they like best.
According to the CHS handbook, grades need to stay up in order to stay in a sport. 5 major subjects have to be passed in order to stay on the sport’s team. But going towards any student in any other extracurricular activity, they only need 4 passing grades to stay in that activity. The school gives sports higher expectations, whenever they’re the students who need more spare time to get their school work done. Students who do extracurricular activities choose them to have fun and get together with their friends. Students work hard to get through their first game whenever they play a sport.
The student handbook states, “The minor subjects are physical education, etc.” If gym is only a minor class, why do athletics need to take their time to participate in that class? I think the school should take it into consideration to give athletics extra time to do their school work, as long as they’re doing sports for the school.
Want to help the Herd? Please consider supporting the Periscope program. Your donation will support the student journalists of CHS and allow us to purchase equipment, send students to workshops/camps, and cover our annual website hosting costs.
Amanda is a staff writer for the second time this year, this time heading our new Student Life section. She loves the when the moon comes out but she...
Sarah Mosinski • Nov 4, 2013 at 11:24 pm
I agree that balancing sports and school work can be extremely difficult. Even though my sport isn’t with the school, I’ve experienced the stress of staying on top of both practices and matches and my schoolwork. There are not only practices and individual workouts that consume a lot of homework time after school, but school athletes have to deal with having games and matches that cut into class time during school, which can be hard to make up. Having extra study halls during the school day would make it easier to actually meet up and speak with teachers about missed class work and getting any extra help needed to stay on top of the assigned homework. It shouldn’t be that hard for athletes, especially if they’re playing for a school team, to have a coach take some sort of attendance so the school would know that you showed up and practiced for a certain amount of hours during the week. Sports practice is a lot more rigorous than PE activities and even athletes who only compete for one season practice more than two days a week, and workout last at least, if not longer than an hour, which means they would get the equivalent of what our PE credit for the year is.
Zack Loudon • Nov 4, 2013 at 11:03 pm
I also believe that athletes should be able to opt out of paticipating in a gym class. As a student athlete, i can testify that some nights ecpecially after away games I may not get home until 11 at night. It is very hard to concentrate on my school work when I am so tired. If i was ale to replace my gym class with a studyhall, I would be able to get some of my homework done in school and not have to do as much as after school and sports.
Amelia W • Oct 31, 2013 at 4:01 pm
It would be awesome if CHS athletes could replace gym class with study halls during their sport seasons. Because many games and matches take place right after school, athletes often have to leave classes early to make it to their events. Athletes are responsible for making up the work they miss in addition to regular homework. Having guaranteed study halls twice a week would give athletes the time they need to make up the missed class work and study for other classes.
Audrey Nickle • Oct 31, 2013 at 3:33 pm
There’s a difference between music activities such as band or musical and playing a sport. While it is true that it uses just as much time, the point of not allowing athletes to participate in gym class is because they are already performing physical activity. The reason that high school students take gym class is to ensure that they are completing a certain amount of physical activity to keep them more fit, as well as introduce the aspects necessary in a lifestyle of fitness and bodily health. Athletes are usually pretty healthy individuals, so this isn’t what they need to address in their lives. It still allows for time management skills to be developed because they have to plan how they use a study hall to make up for the time they use during a sport practice or game.
Sid Ewell • Oct 16, 2013 at 12:17 pm
Athletes shouldn’t have to have a gym class in high schools. High School is trying to prepare us for college and if you play a sport in college, you don’t have to participate in gym. So I feel like athletes in high school should have to option to choose what they want to do.
M • Oct 15, 2013 at 8:00 pm
This completely puts academics behind athletics. Time management is something high school teaches you. If you can’t do your homework when you get home at 7:30, there’s more to the problem than having no time. This also ignores any other students who are involved in other activities. Should the students involved in the musicals get a study hall? Band’s putting in just as many hours- should they?
The article got me thinking, which is always great for a journalist to accomplish. If athletes do not have time for academics, that is a problem in itself- why not dig into that? Might turn out to be something interesting.
Tyler Galaskas • Oct 10, 2013 at 8:56 am
I am an athlete myself, so I know what its like to balance school with sports and now working on top of it all. I believe that having school and sports to balance is a great time management lesson and therefore teaching students lessons and teaching them to manage their time well. I love having gym class twice a week personally because its a great time to get your energy out during school. I personally believe health class is way less important then gym class and that should be the issue at hand for more study halls.
Austin Marks • Oct 16, 2013 at 9:27 am
North Middleton practice must be so hard!
Christian Pavlovich • Oct 7, 2013 at 9:34 pm
Amen! Athletes get plenty of excercise and would benefit from extra study halls!
Christine Finkey • Oct 8, 2013 at 1:52 pm
I think Christian is right. I know some athletes and they work out after school for a couple hours and barely have time to get anything done, so extra study halls could be very beneficial to them for studying and getting homework done.