athletics?

[freetobeme]

anyone send a child to public school for athletics?

i have a young son who lives and breathes sports. our area is sorely lacking in sports for older hs boys. thinking down the road a few years and wondering if there is an alternative i haven't thought of or if this would actually be a legitimate reason to consider school.

ftr, my oldest dd attends a local public high school. my second dd is hs'ing high school, so i am already in both worlds - altho i wish they were all still at home!

thanks!

[plansrme]

I do think this is a legitimate reason to send a child to school. Reasonable minds will certainly be all over the place on this one, but many rational parents have included athletics in their reason to homeschool or not homeschool, and in deciding which school their child would attend (big public school vs. smaller private school, for example).

 

In our case, sports is one of the big reasons we homeschool. I have two athletic daughters in time-consuming sports (swim and gymnastics), and only homeschooling keeps us sane. My daughter's swim coach, who is one of the up-and-coming coaches nationally, wishes all of his swimmers were homeschooled. It is not the sole reason we homeschool, of course, but it is one of the big ones. So yes, since we consider athletics as a reason to homeschool, you are welcome to consider sports as a reason not to do so. ;)

 

We are not slackers in the academic arena, but sports are a big part of our kids' lives. We would be doing our children a disservice by not taking sports (or music or dance or whatever else they do) into consideration when making educational decisions.

 

Terri

[freetobeme]

see, this really helps!

my 2nd and 3rd are home educated and play on a competitive hs girls' basketball team. i never thought of the reverse, just because i never did!

thanks so much. . .and i am open to others' thoughts as well. . .

[Donna]

My oldest is in public school for the first time this year (8th grade) because he wants to wrestle next year in high school. My youngest will probably never go to public school because her area of extreme interest is music and school would interfere more than help her progress.

 

Once a child hits high school age, there is no way to be competitive or have colleges look at you unless you are wrestling in high school. There are open tournaments but fewer and further away once highschool age and the best wrestlers are found in high school tournaments, whereas prior to high school, open tournaments are everywhere and the best wrestlers are still attending them. If he could wrestle with the school team while still homeschooling, we would have considered that.

 

Some activities seem to work best when homeschooling while others require school cooperation at the least.

[Samiam]

Luckily where we live, FL, HSers are allowed, by LAW, to participate in extracurricular activites, ie sports at their local public schools. This has also opened the door for private schools to open their doors for HS athletes. So we have both options here, which was one factor I used in my favor convincing DH to agree with HSing.

 

Now, we are planning on moving to NC, where this is NOT the law. That was not good news for us. BUT HS'ers in NC have rallied together and formed HS sports associations, that typically play against private schools. There has also been legislation introduced in NC to make this the law. Currently it is up to the school district if they want to allow it, some do, some don't.

 

So there are our options. We are only at 6th grade, so it's hard to say. I would, as Mommy, say NO, we wouldn't go to high school JUST to play sports, but in the end, I guess it would have be a group decision between DH, myself and DS.

[freetobeme]

thanks for all your thoughts. he is only a third grader but he talks about playing sports in high school ALL THE TIME so if i can decide it is a legitimate option, that affects my responses to him, rather than just saying, "we'll see. . ."

i am not sure about our state's laws on hs'er participation in the public schools and i will look into that.

:001_smile:

[Danestress]

I have one middle school aged child who is very active in tennis. Tennis isn't really a school sport. Schools have teams, but most of the real competitive action happens outside of schools in state and regional tournaments, and colleges aren't recruiting out of the schools either. We have the same situation with his twin who is a swimmer. Swimmers can swim on school teams, but it's not really the core of the sport.

 

I think a lot of soccer is played on recreational teams or other teams outside of the schools, and I know my friends who have sons involved in baseball are are mostly doing it apart from school, though some of these kids attend school.

 

I wonder if any of these sports are available in your area - sports that are not centered on school teams. For us, we may end up homeschooling longer than we planned because once our sons have become busy with their sports, it's really hard to think about regular school. Competitive tennis players and swimmers train SO much and also travel a lot, and homeschooling actually allows flexibility.

[Pongo]

Our oldest is a competitive soccer player, 2 clubs and a town team. She has practice 4 nights a week and 2 games every weekend. She LOVES it and when everyone took a break around Christmas, she asked if I could find another league:001_huh:. Last year I requested a meeting with that Student of Pupil services and brought to her attention, the talent my daughter has as well as several written letters from her current coaches. I explained how she would love to represent her hometown through school sports, but we did not find that a ready option. Well, they changed the wording in the homeschooling packages stating ALL children living in the District are allowed to tryout for competitive sports at school. I have to get her health records and make sure she is signed off by the school nurse and she will be able to play, while being homeschooled!

[freetobeme]

all these thoughts are very helpful!

i'd love to get him interested in swimming which is very doable here. the tennis and soccer options i hadn't thought of. . .lots of ideas. thanks so much! glad i asked!