By Alejandro Franciscus
Athletes have had people assume that because they are athletes that they aren’t smart and even created a whole “dumb jock” narrative about athletes.
Research shows that is not necessarily true; and that, in fact, being involved in sports has helped increase academic performance.
A study in Kansas between 2008 and 2009 took data from about 8,000 high school students, with half being athletes and the other half being non athletes and comparing things like GPA, ACT scores, and SAT scores. The results showed that while 74% percent of athletes had finished with a 3.0 GPA or higher, only 64% percent of non athletes finished with a 3.0 or higher
The data also showed that during that span in Kansas only 88.1% on non-athletes graduated, compared to the 97.6% of about the 14,000 athletes.
Another study done around the same time gave almost the same results with high school kids who were involved in sports showed more motivation and investment in school because of it.
This study even talked about a specific case involving up to about 12,000 high school athletes results from standardized testing, showing that students involved in sports had a higher probability of getting good grades in school.
All this being said, high school sports, according to multiple research results, has shown a correlation with good grades.
Getting high school students involved in sports activities can bring kids together and contribute many positively to their academics.
JRNL 3065 