High School Sports (Athletics) is a big part of overall High School experience. It gives opportunities for kids to be competitive, overcome adversity, celebrate success. High School years have so many distractions, peer pressure, social media etc. I believe that belonging a High School Sports team helps kids to stay focused.
Having High School Athletics in resume is great for College applications. It demonstrates overall development of the kids.
Middle Schools offer limited choice of Sports e.g. Football (Boys), Basketball (Boys & Girls), Volleyball (Girls), Track (Boys & Girls), Tennis (Boys & Girls), Cross Country (Boys & Girls). The High School choices then expand to more sports e.g. Soft ball, Swimming, Ice Hockey, Golf, Wrestling, and Baseball etc.
High School sport is completely different than the Middle School sports. It becomes extremely competitive.
District, Region, State Championships are very important for the coaches. Therefore in good school districts the varsity level teams become very competitive.
Coaches in the High School just want to win at any cost. Development of kids are not their priority. Therefore, getting into Varsity team becomes very competitive.
If your kid hasn’t played the sport outside competitively, it is very difficult to make to the Varsity team.
Many kids play High School sports for few years in Junior Varsity level and then drop out as it becomes tough. As High School sports also comes with social interactions, team bonding, overcoming challenges etc. I recommend kids to play High School sports as much as they can without hampering academics.
Many kids think that it is easy to play in the High School and College and they can get full scholarships easily. Only a very small percentage of kids who play High School sports play in College and even smaller percent would get scholarship.
If your kid is good in any sports, the college Coaches will find him/her and recruit.
I highly recommend kids to play as much as possible High School sports. It is very important for their overall development. They will make lot of life long friendships. However, academics should be always the number one priority.
