The Atlantic: 'The case against high school sports'

It's bullshit, although not completely.

Public tax money for pro sports stadiums is simply another avenue for direct wealth transfer to strip money away from taxpayers at large to convey it to a minuscule number of fabulously rich individuals. In this it is part of a larger oligarchist conspiracy which pervades society as a whole.

Public support for competitive high school sports is not making many people "rich," although it certainly allows certain individuals (bigname coaches in certain states) to enjoy "very high middle-class" standards of living they would be unlikely to attain otherwise. It's a minor form of income redistribution.

The vast majority of high school sports coaches in most states, including football and basketball coaches, are paid very little. Most HS coaches I have ever known regard their coaching income as gravy. Add in the time requirements most would be financially better off getting more structured part-time jobs to augment their income.

Once you get to college, major-college revenue sports of course, you have people who are getting flat-out RICH off of athletics. There are people making multi-millions a year, who left to their own devices in the actual business world, would be making $25,000.

The main motivations behind public school support of competitive sports are ego gratification for the adult administrators and organizers.

 

Yeah, and having a part time job can also hurt your grades, or playing in the band, or drinking too much beer, or any other sort extracurricular activity if you don't learn time discipline. Don't blame that on sports.

 

Yes, acknowledged in a subsequent post.

 

What a load of fucking shit.

 

My takeaway is that writers for the Atlantic need some remedial lessons in what is and what is not a "cost".

 

in a 1400-2200 student high school is the money spent on sports, for coaches to uniforms to physical plant and equipment an equitable distribution of resources? Or he hit disproportionately impact a small percentage of kids? Additionally does it divert resources that could be used for academic enrichment?

 

I am a high school coach. My coaching supplement is $1,000. If you divide the money by the time I spend doing it, plus throw in the team supplies I pay for out of my own pocket and the money out of my own pocket I give kids if they don't have enough to get something when we stop to eat ... I probably lose money coaching high school sports.

 

Oh, no, the United States does things differently than the rest of the world! This must be stopped!

 

Yeah, South Korea doesn't take sports seriously. Like those multi-level women's golf academies they profiled on Real Sports a few years back.

http://www.jsonline.com/sports/golf/us-womens-open-shows-how-far-us-is-behind-south-korea-fv62108-161737785.html

 

Steak, that sounds a lot like the IMG Academies in Florida. So they aren't doing anything we aren't doing.

And that isn't at a high school. It's at a golf academy. Not really even close to being the same thing.

 

Just noticed your avatar and guffawed. Brilliant.

My grades sucked no matter whether I was in-season or not. Sports were the only thing (besides being a rabble-rouser on the newspaper staff) that kept me even mildly interested in school.

 

If the writer is going to make a point about this Premont, Texas, program, why would she deem to mention that they hadn't made the playoffs in 10 years? That should be a total nonissue when making a decision like this.