Are you a student athlete? Do you struggle with finding time balancing home, sports, and school life? So do I, and so do many other students around the world! Trying to find time to have fun and distress with all these external factors is challenging, that is why it’s so important to keep track of student/child mental health. Deeper looks into the effects of sports on young adults mentally and what areas of the brain sports target. 

Sports have many effects on the brain, both being positive and negative but do sports help or harm students more overall? Many students use sports as a distresser, letting off stress and tension built up throughout the school day. However, this all changes when classwork, homework, and larger assignments are involved. Furthermore, when athletes have long practice and they still need to find time to work, balance home life, and finding themselves, it becomes overwhelming.

Athletes and Schoolwork
As previously mentioned, playing sports and having to make up and do classwork on your own time becomes a difficult task when other things are involved and you want to have fun. This can lead to further procrastination and missing assignments. Asking athletes in Amityville Memorial High School “How many assignments do you have to make up?” one athlete said, “I’m not sure, but if I had to think, maybe one paper, a presentation, and two homework assignments.”? Another student, a softball athlete, when asked shared, “Some classwork from APUSH and a summary for AP Research, but I don’t know when I’ll find time to complete it!”. If you’re wondering how this compares to a student who doesn’t play sports well here you go, a non sports playing student when asked this question answered, “ I think only one, but it’s from a class that I don’t really care all that much about.”. Taking these responses from only three of the twenty-five students asked, fifteen of those being athletes and the other ten being regular students, around ten of the athletes reported feeling tired, stressed, and more weighed down throughout the day. That translates to about 2/3 of AMHS athletes!

Athletes and Home Life
Many athletes also struggle with having to balance going to school, having a two to three hour practice and then coming home to do more work and get their regular household maintenance done, while finding time to work and finish classwork on top of that. This leads many students to come home, shower and lay in bed, overwhelmed by the mountain of things to do. This not only stresses the students out but also the parents. For students to find time to work they would also have to work at night or alternatively on the weekends. Obstacles like that are reasons why students today are so stressed, and people just call them lazy without going in depth as to why they  feel this way. Asking students in AMHS two out of twelve said they work nights, eight said they only work weekends, one added that he works an hour before practice showing up late every day, and the final student said that he works nights and weekends, showing up in the morning to catch up with work and hang out later in the day. All of these students experienced heightened stress from their responsibilities added onto school and sports.

Personal Opinion
Sports have many effects on students across the world, some good and some bad. In my opinion if left without fixing sports are more negative for many students rather than positive as they add extra stress that students and young adults in general do not need. However, with the proper steps and the motivation to try and take control of the negative effects sports can have, it can become a positive and beneficial experience for athletes and even promote better mental health. Some ways to achieve this can include:

• Setting aside time to complete classwork
• Getting 6-8 hours of quality sleep
• Actively working during class time
• Working as a group with friends
• Evaluating if sports or working is more important to you and choosing between the two
• Finding a hobby to let out stress in a healthy way
• Establish good relationships with teachers so that you can see about getting extensions on work

These are some of the many ways to create a more positive relationship with your mental health while balancing school, sports, and home life. I find that putting time aside to hang out with friends on the weekends is a great way to deload and reset for the week. And that is how you can overcome the challenges of balancing sports, life, and your education!