The high cost of sports

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				THE
Column Archive				VIRGINIA GAZETTE
				WILLIAMSBURG, VIRGINIA
The high cost of sports				August 9, 2008

Last week came a complaint from a student at Jamestown High School that his course in field biology had been somewhat less than rewarding because out-of-sight transportation costs were forcing administrators to crack down on buses used for academic programs. Trips to the fields were severely limited, leaving students with a course whose guts had been expediently excised.

At the same time, few, if any, cuts were made in the transportation budget for athletic teams. They seem to have reached all their fields without distraction.

Those who haven’t taken the time to peruse the latest Williamsburg-James City County school budget might be surprised to find that the amount budgeted for transportation in the upcoming session is a whopping $7,251,929. The amount taxpayers are popping for athletic programs comes to $1,039,411.

Something’s gotta give.

As administrators and school boards across the country crunch numbers and find themselves in the grinder from hell, more and more systems are coming to the conclusion that, despite protests from parents, non-academic programs must be either drastically cut or eliminated altogether.

Pressure to increase standardized test scores and meet the requirements of No Child Left Behind means more teachers, more remedial work hours and smaller classes. The result is a head butt between academics and athletics or any other activity requiring school funding. Even courses in physical education may become a thing of the past.

According to a recent article in The New York Times, the city of Mount Vernon, NY has decided, after voters twice turned down the school budget, to eliminate their entire athletic budget of over $1 million. Bleached out will be 55 teams and the 700 students who participate in them.

In Dearborn, Mich., athletic teams will find their seasons cut by a quarter, thus saving the city $130,000 on busing and coaching.

Much like the current situation relative to SUVs, huge pickup trucks and the price of gas, athletics have been allowed to roll along untrammeled as an integral part of the middle and high school experience. As expenses skyrocket, however, the question of productivity or efficiency relative to actual need arises. Is it really more important for athletic teams to get to their fields than for a class in field biology to reach its grounds of study?

Those who support athletic programs emphasize the importance of teamwork and socialization. School spirit, they maintain, depends almost solely on somewhat rapturous relationships with victorious teams.

Yet, is socialization and team spirit really the business of an academic institution? If No Child Behind has had any positive effect at all – and I’m not sure that it has – it is that the emphasis of schools must be on academics and that even the captain of a winning football team must be able to reach certain standards in math, science, English and social studies. If he doesn’t, all the school spirit and teamwork in the world isn’t going to save his hide from failure.

As far as I know, the WJC School Board hasn’t discussed any alternatives to its bloated athletics budget. Or what effect on the transportation budget a reduced or defunct athletics program would have.

While I’m sure that there would be hoopla from Hades if they decided to eliminate athletics altogether, there are some alternatives worth discussing.

Why, for instance, does every high school and every middle school have to have its own athletics program? Why does each high school need fund-devouring programs in football, basketball, swimming, baseball, volleyball or any other sport? Do we really need massive gymnasiums and playing fields for every school we build?

In addition to doing away with costly and ineffective middle school athletics completely, the School Board should seriously consider a consolidated city/county high school program that would fund one team for each sport made up of students from all the schools. Under such a system, the overstaffed and overstuffed coaching teams that we now have for each school could be eliminated, to be replaced by only one staff for each team.

In addition, the transportation costs of busing one team would be dramatically less than those incurred under the present multi-layered athletics program.

Another possibility is for parents or corporations to foot the bill for individual athletic programs. Parents in Wantagh, NY have already collected over $300,000 to revive the 100 sports programs that were dropped in that system’s budget cutting process.

With gas prices and education costs what they are, we simply cannot afford to keep funding and operating Hummer-like school systems. If indeed the emphasis on academics is a given, we must scrutinize ancillary programs carefully with a view to either eliminating them or transforming them into more cost effective entities.

As real estate taxes and other fees continue to soar, like Icarus, perilously close to the sun, we should all insist that school budgets be introduced to the concept of reality. We should also be assured that field biology will always trump cheerleading and football.