School funding faces a tough future. Clearly, cuts are imminent, and in tough times, interscholastic athletics are often targeted.
Some administrators see athletics as an "extra," not really a part of the educational process, while others expect a greater response if athletics are threatened. Levies get more attention if cuts involve sports. My first principal hated this tactic, referring to it as "beating the parents until the kids cry." He decried depriving kids to promote levy support.
I’ve always argued the value of athletics to those who couldn’t or wouldn’t see by explaining that athletics "keep the lid" on a school. Athletics is a "carrot" leading participants to maintain their eligibility. Good coaches keep track of team members’ progress and provide support for teachers. The "stick" often manifests itself in study tables at turnout and penalties or lost participation if standards are not met, including being a positive element in the classroom. Ask any of my former wrestlers what happened to team members who gave teachers a hard time.
Athletes can often have a rough edge, but loads of potential. Coaches can really bring this potential out, while also smoothing those rough edges. Without the special relationship athletics provides, active kids can become problems in the school.
I remember hearing once that if it hadn’t been for a certain sports program, "you’d be hearing jail doors slam all over Snohomish County." That was an exaggeration, obviously, and one should not forget the kids who enter sports programs as great, well-adjusted kids.
Statistics indicate, however, 70 percent of troubled kids come from single-parent families, and the missing parent is often the father. In many cases, coaches, male and female, fill that gap. They provide "tough love" that, historically, society expects from the father. It’s not that coaches can do this better than classroom teachers, it’s just that they have a venue that gives them more opportunity to fill this role. Administrators who don’t see this should consider what things would be like if they didn’t have athletics as the "carrot" and the "stick" to batten down the hatches of their school.
I’ll always remember a young man who wrestled on my junior high team early in my career. He was a sweet kid, tough and earnest. His mother, who thought the world of the boy and was raising him by herself, worried about how "rough" wrestling was. Unfortunately, this young man was one of those who we would refer to by saying, "he could go either way." Outside of the influence of the athletes and coaches, he often chose some poor company.
His mother finally pulled him from the sport. Sadly, his influences outside athletics took him into areas that proved to be negative life choices. Do I think he might have turned out differently if he hadn’t quit wrestling? Absolutely, because his teammates and coaches could provide a lifeline away from negative influences.
Another question one might ask is, "How about these kids from stable families, with both parents and many of the pluses in their lives that a lot of kids do without? What does interscholastic athletics do for them?"
When I was inducted into the State Wrestling Coaches Hall of Fame, I got a letter from one of my former wrestlers. He told me how much wrestling had done for him. I responded by telling him that I always assumed that a young man like him, from a great family and with everything going for him as a person, probably didn’t get that much from the program. This young man, now a doctor, told me that wrestling provided mental and physical toughness.
When one’s upbringing is free of most of the bumps life can provide, that hard-nosed nature of our sport gave him the edge when facing the exhaustion and travail the long, difficult process of becoming a doctor put before him. I don’t know if I ever heard anything that made me feel better about my sport and my coaching career.
As we consider the inevitable cuts that funding problems will bring about, I sincerely hope that we fully examine the unique role interscholastic coaches and athletics play in making schools special for so many young people.
There is no program without value in schools. All program cuts are sad, and in a perfect world cuts wouldn’t ever be made. I must emphasize, however, that the role of interscholastic athletics is unique and irreplaceable, and must be fervently protected in the best interests of our young people.
Freelance writer Bruce W. Burns, a retired teacher and coach, lives in Marysville.
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