<p>CCers please give me your opinion. Im very bothered by this and trying to decide if I should approach the school. </p>
<p>This spring our Boys Basketball team qualified for the state tournament. In response the school held a pep rally, during school hours, at both the high school and middle school to show support for our competitors as they departed for state. Several of our students missed their afternoon classes so they could leave to attend the game. This was considered an excused absence. Unfortunately, our Boys were elliminated in the early round. </p>
<p>A couple of month later our Speech Team qualified several students for their state tournament. They left with the support of the parents who dropped them off. They returned with a State Championship. Their accomplishment was read in the morning announcements along with routine news. </p>
<p>In our state the tournaments for speech and basketball are almost identical. Our students face the same level of competition, and have to beat out the same number of schools, to qualify and succeed at State. This is true for nearly all of our competitive activities. </p>
<p>Im not bothered by the recognition that they did or didnt receive, but I am disturbed by how disproportionate it was. Winning state is very rare for our school. I cant even think of a team that has done it. </p>
<p>I know this problem has been around for a long time, but doesnt this seem a bit extreme ? Should I say something or am I just beating my head ?</p>
<p>I wholeheartedly agree but it is a losing battle - athletic achievements at the high school level are always recognized with more fanfare than academic achievements. Especially when the seniors are awarded scholarships - all of the “good citizen” type stuff goes to those with multiple varsity sports letters!</p>
<p>I don’t see any harm in speaking to the principal, saying that the state championship merited greater recognition than a line in the morning announcements, but what do you have in mind? Do you want a pep rally, too? My kid would be mortified if I suggested such a thing. </p>
<p>I think changing the culture of a school to appropriately recognize academic achievements, not just athletic ones, is a long-term proposition but one worth the effort. Just have some ideas in mind for what you think is appropriate. Maybe something on the front page of the school website? A press release from the district? Good luck!</p>
<p>If you complain to the principal or other school officials you may be able to get some temporary recognition for the achievements of the Speech team, but don’t expect any big long-term cultural shifts. </p>
<p>Glorifying the athlete above all others dates back at least to the ancient Greeks. It’s not going to change any time soon. Think of the magnitude of fame and riches showered on the stars of NBA and compare that to the meager living and attention that the pro star competitors of the National Speech Association earn…Oops! Wait! There is no National Speech Association… There is no pro speech competition league. And that’s rather the point.</p>
<p>1) I am thankful that my ds’s school does a great job of recognizing academic accomplishments. If you PM me, I can give you ideas for how to raise the profile of academics at your school. But also know that I believe that to b*tch is to volunteer. You or someone else will have to step up and volunteer to get these things done.</p>
<p>2) I’ve written this before on other threads … While some on here like to bash on athletes for getting so much acclaim, remember that all they do is out there for all to see. Yes, there’s applause for the buzzer beater and the winning goal, but athletes also make themselves vulnerable in front of all by striking out in the bottom of the ninth or missing the free throw, etc. Academics don’t have the 68 on a pre-cal test printed in the newspaper; athletes get to read the next morning about all they did wrong – and so does everyone else. There are two sides to this coin.</p>
<p>Umm. I know what you mean, but you just don’t get the spectator interest for speech/debate as you do for a basket ball game. We’ve gone to regular season basket ball games and it’s a festive rousing crowd and a lot of kids, even not from the school, parents who don’t have kids playing are there to watch the game. For a debate? Even one at the school itself, only the parents show up. The same with chess tournaments. It’s just not the same level of spectator interest.</p>
<p>Sports are that way too. Ever go to a track meet? If you don’t have a kid in it, few people do, and even parents drop the kid off and run most of the time. Not so for the basketball, football, hockey and other such sports. There is a difference and it goes right on through college. One year a local college decided to feature their girls’ soccer team for the homecoming game for alums instead of the usual football game. Hardly anyone showed up. The market does drive some of these things.</p>
<p>But if given the opportunity, many fellow students would cheer and march to support an “academic” winner. They just need the right amount of prodding from the administration.</p>
<p>Quote of the day. Should be posted above the door of every principal, activity director, athletic director and guidance counselor in the country!</p>
<p>Never gripe unless you have an idea for a solution, and are willing to help make it happen.</p>
<p>At our school, if it’s not football, it’s not much. Years back our basketball team went deep into the playoffs, and the only way I knew was by reading it in newspaper sports stats. But if football would ever even win District, it would be treated like they’d won the Super Bowl. </p>
<p>I had to laugh because one year the school won two national championships - drum line and drill team. Barely a mention. Last year, cheer won a national championship. Barely a mention.</p>
<p>Parents and a few “influential” kids need to press the administration for recognition. It can be done. When girls’ soccer went to the state championship, there was actually a fan bus with kids attending getting excused absences.</p>
<p>My H and I have volunteered to handle Publicity for our kids’ main activities. Now instead of complaining about the lack of recognition, we are the ones who try our best to get the news on the school web site, the district web site, in the local paper, etc. Parents really need to handle publicity. The coach is likely a teacher who has just been out of town coaching/chaperoning the kids…they are often unlikely to have the energy or motivation to publicize the achievements after the fact; they just want to get caught up at home and at work.</p>
<p>One of the speech team parents needs to step up and make the publicity happen. Our School Board will even recognize student achievements at their meetings (with appropriate handshakes and photographs) if someone makes them aware of them. When the cheer team won the national championship, they were invited to be recognized by the school board, but the coach was leaving the school and dropped the ball.</p>
<p>One more thing. One year, the kids who made PSAT honors (NMSF, etc.) were honored centerfield one year before a football game. It hasn’t happened again, so it was likely a parent who said, “hey, while everyone is just sitting here waiting for the game to start, how about calling the smart kids out to the field and making them feel great?”</p>
<p>Exactly what missy said. No principal or school board is going to turn down the offer to help publicize the good academic things happening in their schools or districts. But they’ve got other priorities right now. Parents and kids have to help them realign their priorities.</p>
<p>Our public hs has a very comprehensive EC program and the level of attention almost always reflects the amount of work some parent is doing with the help of a teacher. Our business club, TSA, Ocean Bowl, etc. all are mentioned often in the local paper and that’s because somebody made sure to get the word out. The music department has a phenomenal parent support group that doggedly promotes all the students who are doing marvelous things – sometimes that means education, too. I don’t know anything at all about Ocean Bowl, but when a parent who does puts a national win in context, I’m impressed even so. </p>
<p>Sports will always be cooler, and get more attention. Annoying, but not the end of the world.</p>
<p>Speech isn’t a spectator sport/activity. I have to agree that if you want to raise awareness, contact the local newspapers, submit articles for the school paper, make fliers to post around school. If the kids don’t know about what is happening, how are they going to support the activity? I have to say that academics get top billing at our school. You will find more information about success in the classroom than anything. Our marching band probably gets the next most recognition. After that I would say everything else gets equal billing–sure, the football team gets mentioned weekly because they play weekly but the kids in speech get noticed when they compete too. A lot comes down to the coach/adviser for the program too. There are years when the varsity players on our kids’ sports teams have NO idea how the JV kids did because their coach doesn’t share that information. We usually find out from other teams how our team did.</p>
<p>I wouldn’t bring the Greeks into it. Rewarding high school athletes in the US is a more recent phenomenon and is somewhat related to the recognition by US military leaders after WWII that their recruits were often in poor physical shape.</p>
<p>My DW grew up in China and according to her those with athletic accomplishments in their equivalent of high school are virtually ignored, while the academic stars are envied and put on a pedestal. Of course they value their Olympic-level athletes, but those are few and are often segregated.</p>
<p>The OP is complaining about lack of acclaim for speech competitors who won the state championship. Last time I checked high school speech competitions were held in public - with spectators welcome to come and watch and reporters welcome to come and write newspaper stories about every flub and mistake the competitors make. Same for High School Bowl, Chess, and Debate competitions. They are not held in private, closed venues with the public kept out. </p>
<p>Thus the academic competitors are putting themselves out there for all to see every bit as much as their athletic classmates. But of course the public, and hence the news media, aren’t interested. They don’t care who won, who lost, who blew the lead with a big flub at the end. No interest. Why? Well, like I said, we live in a culture that glorifies the athlete above all others.</p>
<p>The exception that proves the rule is the National Spelling Bee, which has somehow gotten itself popular enough to get commonly mentioned on news reports and in some years even televised. And you see those kids’ losses, mistakes, and triumphs are every bit as dramatic and pressure-filled as any faced by any kid at the free-throw line. So facing public pressure is not what sets athletics apart from academics competitions. But so far this is pretty much the only academic competition that gets any attention. And it’s still small potatoes compared to the sports competitions.</p>
<p>–coureur–in our state the High School Bowls (assuming you are talking knowledge/quiz bowl) are not open to the public. Spectators are not allowed in the rooms because it’s too easy to cheat :D. I’ve been to a couple speech tournaments…not many parents go to these, let alone classmates. :D</p>
<p>I think this is an issue that will not go away. My kids are in a “non spectator” sport and they never have classmates watching them. They understand that and are OK with it. Even though my son was the only freshman athlete to make a state level competition last year - he certainly wasn’t glorified like the football team that went to state this year. But it is what it is!!!</p>
<p>Oh and BTW - the National Spelling Bee is televised every year - on ESPN none the less! Go figure.</p>
You or someone else will have to step up and volunteer to get these things done.</p>