Pineda 1

Katherine Pineda

Professor Batty

English 101

21 March 2019

Football College athletes

Being in college can be hard and take up a lot of time for the student to be able to study

and pass their classes. Now being a student athlete can be much harder to be successful in

college. Education can get harder when the students decides that they want to play a sport in

college because it can be hard to keep up with everything. Being able to manage your time in

college is so important. College students who play football tend to practice everyday. Football

practice usually runs for about 3 hours long and after practice students have to go home and still

worry about doing their homework. It can be so tiring after practice to do their homework and

worry about school. Although most people may argue that football coaches want for their team

to do good and just focus on that they still need their players to have good grades, it may still be

hard for in new coming college students to be successful with their time because they are still

new and getting use to the routine. Something that the school or the football coaches can do is

help them adjust and teach them how to handle their time so they can get use to it.

College football has always been a very big and popular thing and most people know

about it. The college coaches have a lot to do in influencing the players. They mostly want for

their team to be good but if the athlete does not have a good gpa they will not be able to play.

Having good grade is very important to being able to play and to still be successful in college.

Pineda 2
The way someone can be successful in school in school is by doing all their work and studying

for their exams. They cannot do that if they do not know how to manage their time, they have to

know that they are a student first and then an athlete. You have to know your priorities before

anything else. In the article, “Are you managing your time, or is it managing you?” it states,

“Time management is the art of knowing what you want and what is important to you, the ability

to identify the key goals and specific tasks in the near- and long-term future, and the willingness

to prioritize your tasks regularly” (White, Susan Letterman). When playing football in college

you have to know that school comes first but it playing is also a big part of the students life.

School should be as important as the sport is for the student.

As the first year for the college student there is a lot of resources for them to know what

they want to and how they want to spend their college time. Students who played football in high

school most likely come into college wanting to keep on playing. Most of the time the coaches

have a very influence on their players, if the player does not have grades they are mostly likely to

get punished for not having grades. Ways a coach can help the students deal with school and still

be successful in school is by setting up a day of the week as a study hall day. Some students just

go to college for the sport. For example, In the article, “A Study Of Factors That Influence High

School Athletes To Choose A College Or University, And A Model For The Development Of

Players Decision” it says, “The decisions made during the formative years have a tremendous

impact upon the individual as well as the institution that the athlete chooses to attend “ (Rayan,

Cory J). Students have to make a big choice on what school they want to go to but they go to the

one they know the team is good if they are athletes.

Pineda 3
 A degree should be more important for the student. They always tells you to go do

something you love. You just have to know that school does come first so that you are able to be

successful in school and in your football career. If football does not work the student then they

would be able to have a degree on something else they enjoy to do. Also if they make it in

professional football they should still have a degree in case they get hurt or they simply in do not

want to play anymore. In the article “Young athletes, a degree matters” it states “I must point out

that a college diploma is more important than ever for those who expect to sign a contract for big

dollars.” this is saying that college athletes should get their degree so they could be able to get

more money. An education is more important nowadays because people are expecting more

diplomas to be given out. If you know how to handle your time you can have both the education

and the sport that you love to play in. In coming freshman should take a counseling class so they

have a plan for the whole 4 years that they are in college and know what their focus is. They

should start up a routine so they can get use to it and follow through.

If the college student does not know how to deal with time their grades will go down and

they will not be able to play and do what they want to do. Struggling in college can be so hard to

reach your goals so the students has to make sure that they do not get side track and they stay

doing their work so they can do what they really want to do after college. Coaches should stay

updated in the athletes school work just so they know how the student is doing and they can be

able to help them out in whatever they need. The students also needs to be able to go and talk to

their coach and tell them that they might not be able to make it to practice because they need to

go to their professor’s office hours so they can talk to them about their work and their grades.

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 Coaches put a lot of pressure on the football players to be good. They practice for so long

and have to maintain these type of grades to be able to play. For them to stay on track they have

a lot to do and the game also tend to last long time. The player will become stress and a lot can

happen to their body and mental health if they are not taking things slow as they should be. This

is why it is important for them to know how to handle their time. It is so important for the

student to know when to get their work done and for them to know when to take a step back and

just rest, they need to take time for themselves.

In conclusion, managing your time is more important than just doing things all last

minute and putting so much stress on yourself. Time management is really important in college

because you have to know when everything should be done and have this time schedule. I think

the sport should be play for fun but also some people do love it and want to make it big in that

way. They should follow their dreams but also see how important it is to get a college degree.

The best way both can work out is if the coach can just put more effort on the students by

actually telling them the importance of a degree. If the students needs a bit more help in

education then they should be able to miss practice to go get some tutoring.

Work cited
Abdul-Jabbar, Kareem. “ Young athletes, a degree matters.” Espn.com, 6 Sep 2012,

http://www.espn.com/college-sports/story/_/id/8344785/young-athletes-degree-matters

Ryan, Cory J., et al. “A Study of Factors That Influence High School Athletes to Choose

a College or University, and a Model for the Development of Player Decisions.” College

Student Journal, vol. 41, no. 3, Sept. 2007, pp. 532–539. EBSCOhost,

library.lavc.edu/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=eric&

AN=EJ777962&site=eds-live.

White, Susan Letterman. “Are You Managing Your Time, or Is It Managing You?”

Virginia Lawyers Weekly, 2019. EBSCOhost,

library.lavc.edu/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=edsga

o&AN=edsgcl.578400489&site=eds-live.