Time of Class:
Positive and Negative Effects of Sports on Students
Sports is a unifying factor as it brings together people from diverse backgrounds and therefore should be encouraged and supported. Green argues that talented students should be given a chance to exploit their talent and should not be barred from doing so as they can have shining careers in their field of specialization, just as he was in the NFL. Such success can greatly contribute to one’s greater happiness in life something we all yearn for. Sports can be educative as they provide vital life lessons to students such as teamwork, hard work, resilience and tolerance. With the right and necessary reforms in sports management in schools the players and society at large stand to benefit. Such would include ensuring necessary compensation for players and allowing maximum trickle-down of profits to them as opposed to the management and a system largely viewed as exploitative. The problem here is not sports but moral obligations and economic measures/policies.
Much has also been brought forth against sports in schools. According to Bissinger, College football is distractive and has nothing to with the primary purpose of education: Academics. He argues that the average student gets nothing from football programs that remain less beneficial despite tuition increases. The programs are time consuming and it is not uncommon that they have eaten into academic time. This is the case in most colleges where much focus has been shifted to sports and little time spared for intellectual work, the principal foundation of colleges. This is a typical case of misplaced priorities .It is expensive to run such programs for a lot goes into building stadia, and hiring staff like coaches. More often than not such coaches are better paid than even their departmental counter parts. The system is largely exploitative for players themselves do not benefit. Millions gained go into paying a swollen number of sports department staff and what’s left ends up in the hands of a few individuals, leaving the players empty handed. Nothing can define exploitation any better. There’s also the medical danger associated with repetitive hits - an example being John Seau who suffered from chronic traumatic encephalopathy, a disease caused by repeated trauma to the head. Concussions are common too.
Work cited
Ban College Football: An Intelligence Squared U.S. Debate. Dir. Wolfe S. Dana, Donvan John, Conner Clea. 26 May 2012. Film.
<http://fora.tv/2012/05/08/Ban_College football>
