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[RedTop]

This same situation for our family ended like this: My BIL and SIL pushed their oldest son with football. Everything was done with football in mind, and the goal for a college scholarship so he could study to be a doctor. All through high school this kid worked on weight and strength training for football; no major attention paid to his academics. His only options for college were local, and he wasn't good enough for college football. By the end of his first semester in college, he was on academic probation, and failed all but one of his classes (we later learned he hadn't even bought textbooks for all of his classes, but relied on the on-line information access, which was not as intense as the textbook). By the end of his second semester, he was still failing everything, so that was the end of college for him. All summer he worked on losing weight in order to meet requirements for the U.S. Army, and left for Georgia last October. In 8 months, the military has done more with this young man than his parents did in 19 years, so I see some hope ahead for him. However, Mom and Dad have planted that doctor idea so deep, this young man continues to talk about college and using his military benefits to continue his education. Maybe as he matures, he can make it happen---if it's what he really wants, but I have never seen the academic side of him to really get behind him and support the doctor idea. I absolutely do not believe this young man has the smarts, nor the drive to become a doctor.

Now BIL and SIL are pushing second son with baseball. BIL actually spent $250 for a custom bat for this kid, and his world revolves around baseball. Again, no attention to academics, and this kid is just barely passing to the next grade. Their youngest child is a girl, and she's just starting junior high, with a college attitude. BIL and SIL finally took her computer access away (except for homework needs), due to her postings on Facebook---which they had no idea about until someone told them. I think this child will be H*** on wheels for her parents, based on her recent actions, and how she is thought of by her classmates.

Watching these 3 kids grow up, has reinforced the efforts my husband and I made in raising our 2 girls. We were always firm and steady with our parenting, but we NEVER pushed our girls into doing what we wanted them to do. Their career choices were theirs to make, and we supported them in every way we could. However, academics always came first and they knew that. Our oldest daughter did get a full athletic scholarship, but gave that up after the first year of college when she knew exactly what she wanted to major in. With a BS and 2 Master's, she has always excelled academically. Our youngest daughter had no interest in college, but has always had a job and supported herself. When she decided she wanted to drive a tractor trailer, she was the only female in a class of 10, and she finished at the top of the class. She was also the only student who scored a perfect score on her DOT testing. Just the idea of parking a tractor trailer spazzes me out, but she did it perfectly during her testing.

I just think too many parents try to force their children into being who they want them to be, and never take the time to find out who their children really are, in order to truly help them be who they are meant to be.

[lolakimono]

This is what I see in middle school:

By the time they are in middle school, many have been playing their sport for years, and sometimes all year round. I have kids in casts, boots, slings, braces, crutches, and "disabled" for their sport. They have concussions, fractures, stress fractures of growth plates, tears, dislocations, and multiple surgeries. When you start too early and focus entirely on sports, odds are that by the time you get to college you will be burnt out or injured to the extent that you cannot play for the scholarship you spent all this time trying to earn.

[hckynut]

On 6/7/2014 happy housewife said:

My great nephew plays ice hockey all winter and in the summer roller hockey. He is 9 and just finishing up 4th grade. He has school until 3PM and gets off the bus at home shortly after that. He has to be at hockey practice every day from 6 to 8 PM. So they have to leave for practice by 5:30. So he has 2 hours from school until leaving for practice - every day - he has to finish his homework and eat his dinner in that amount of time. His Mom was saying his homework seems to hard and is taking him too long every day and his grades are dropping. she thinks this hockey is extremely important because she thinks he will get a college scholarship from it. She went to the teacher and said she wanted him excused from homework for the remainder of the year so he can concentrate on hockey. This was a few weeks ago. So now it is finals week and he is way behind. Don't parents place any value on their kid's education anymore ? What good does getting a scholarship do anyway if he doesn't get the grades to go to top college? This child attends a private school, if she doesn't value his education - why bother? She is doing the same thing now with his first grade brother now only for him it is football.

Can anyone enlighten me as to why these sports are so all important these days?

I could go on and on about the game of ice hockey but I understand it just happens to be "the sport" in this particular thread. For me to completely understand something like this is not possible because as I've said here for years now, I have nor had any children.

Spent decades of my life around sport parents of children of almost all ages. Like non-sports oriented people, they can run from A to Z and every letter in between. Some I know and have known on a very personal level while others I know only by their behavior and actions while at the ice rink.

As much as I've seen things change over my many years the one thing where I have seen little to no change is in your last sentence(question in this thread). While I have my own views on the importance of sports, more specifically a team sport, some will do their best to sincerely try to understand the "why" of some parents. Others here will glance at the overall picture of what their views are of it and quickly move on.

While I have never been one to view "education" as the be-all of ones life I certainly understand the importance of having to be educated. When it comes to formal education I certainly did not come from or have I reached any high level in that regard for sure. While many around me of my age were getting a formal education I was getting an education on life sans teachers and/or books.

Life to and for me was never about how educated I might be and where that would lead me through my lifetime. I was and will always be one that wants to learn while at the same time prefer my learning come from experiencing as opposed to other more formal ways of achieving it.

When it comes to sports and its relationship to a formal education? What I can tell you about the game of ice hockey when it comes to getting a possible college scholarship could/would take me a very long time to type I will spare you and everyone here.

[brii]

He's only 9 now. A lot of things can and will change by the time he's older.

The mom is in for a rude awakening if she is putting so much emphasis on scholarships now

[croemer]

On 6/8/2014 brii said:

He's only 9 now. A lot of things can and will change by the time he's older.

The mom is in for a rude awakening if she is putting so much emphasis on scholarships now

Scholarships+poor grades=NO scholarship.

[brii]

On 6/8/2014 croemer said:

On 6/8/2014 brii said:

He's only 9 now. A lot of things can and will change by the time he's older.

The mom is in for a rude awakening if she is putting so much emphasis on scholarships now

Scholarships+poor grades=NO scholarship.

yes

[croemer]

On 6/8/2014 brii said:

On 6/8/2014 croemer said:

On 6/8/2014 brii said:

He's only 9 now. A lot of things can and will change by the time he's older.

The mom is in for a rude awakening if she is putting so much emphasis on scholarships now

Scholarships+poor grades=NO scholarship.

yes

You must have both...talent and poor grades equal no offers. Marginally grades+scholarship and you put all your effort in the sport and the grades drop...scholarship is pulled.

[brii]

We just had an interesting conversation with a recruiter a few weeks ago. He said he's looking for "the whole package" in kids - grades, skill, personality, service to the community, and the omnipresent ACT score, and parents who don't complain to coaches and interfere with their kids in a negative light.

[croemer]

On 6/8/2014 brii said:

We just had an interesting conversation with a recruiter a few weeks ago. He said he's looking for "the whole package" in kids - grades, skill, personality, service to the community, and the omnipresent ACT score, and parents who don't complain to coaches and interfere with their kids in a negative light.

When my DD got her scholarship we got the same speech, it does no good to give a scholarship if it then has to be pulled...they do not want the trouble.

[brii]

On 6/8/2014 croemer said:

On 6/8/2014 brii said:

We just had an interesting conversation with a recruiter a few weeks ago. He said he's looking for "the whole package" in kids - grades, skill, personality, service to the community, and the omnipresent ACT score, and parents who don't complain to coaches and interfere with their kids in a negative light.

When my DD got her scholarship we got the same speech, it does no good to give a scholarship if it then has to be pulled...they do not want the trouble.

I bet...