2008 Woodie Awards
Student athletes face stress on and off the field
Many find it tough to balance their classes and studies with athletics
Jacquelie Olivares
Issue date: 11/14/05 Section: Sports
College can be stressful for all students, but people believe that athletes may experience greater levels of stress due to the dual demands of athletics and academics.
The biggest challenges that student-athletes face are time issues.
These issues arise at the level of daily planning, semester-long planning and even planning their four years at Lewis. Student-athletes have to balance class time, practice time, study time and competition time. This is excluding time to eat, sleep and have a social life.
This is not to say that non-athletic students at Lewis University do not have stress, but being an athlete adds to the stress that you have from schoolwork.
College sports require a lot of dedication and commitment. When students sign up for a team, they make a commitment to attend practices and games, prioritizing their team obligations above most other activities, not including schoolwork.
As with most sports, athletes are required to achieve a certain standard of performance in academics in order to stay on the team. Keeping one's grades up and getting good attendance at practices and games becomes demanding, with the little free time left being spent on homework, eating and sleeping.
Not everything is stressful for student-athletes, because doctors do recommend exercise as a stress reducer. But exercise and competitive exercise are two different things. Competitive exercise adds stress because you are always expected to do well in a competition or a race.
"Nursing is a difficult major, and it requires a lot of your time," said Megan Stevenson, who is majoring in nursing and is also a member of the Lewis women's swim team.
"This year, I am balancing swimming and nursing, but I know that next year I will not be able to do so with my clinicals starting. Sometimes I do find myself stressed out because it is difficult to wake up for morning practice four days out of the week and go straight to class and keep my grades up. If I were not swimming, I would be able to get more rest and sleep."
Another swimmer, Trisha Meyerchick, said, "Sometimes swimming does add stress, especially around conference, because not only are you thinking about your school work but you are also thinking about how you will perform in your race. Although overall I do not think that swimming adds a lot of stress because, in a way, after a long day, when I finally get in the pool for practice, I feel good and I feel that I can leave all my problems behind when I swim by working hard. So I would say that swimming lets me release stress and anger."
Student Adam Brown said, "Sometimes teachers add to the stress of student-athletes. For example, when you miss a test because you are gone for a meet, some teachers do not let you make up the tests."
The amount of stress that a student-athlete has depends on the student and on the sport that they are involved in. Ultimately, the student was the one who decided to be involved in the sport.
The biggest challenges that student-athletes face are time issues.
These issues arise at the level of daily planning, semester-long planning and even planning their four years at Lewis. Student-athletes have to balance class time, practice time, study time and competition time. This is excluding time to eat, sleep and have a social life.
This is not to say that non-athletic students at Lewis University do not have stress, but being an athlete adds to the stress that you have from schoolwork.
College sports require a lot of dedication and commitment. When students sign up for a team, they make a commitment to attend practices and games, prioritizing their team obligations above most other activities, not including schoolwork.
As with most sports, athletes are required to achieve a certain standard of performance in academics in order to stay on the team. Keeping one's grades up and getting good attendance at practices and games becomes demanding, with the little free time left being spent on homework, eating and sleeping.
Not everything is stressful for student-athletes, because doctors do recommend exercise as a stress reducer. But exercise and competitive exercise are two different things. Competitive exercise adds stress because you are always expected to do well in a competition or a race.
"Nursing is a difficult major, and it requires a lot of your time," said Megan Stevenson, who is majoring in nursing and is also a member of the Lewis women's swim team.
"This year, I am balancing swimming and nursing, but I know that next year I will not be able to do so with my clinicals starting. Sometimes I do find myself stressed out because it is difficult to wake up for morning practice four days out of the week and go straight to class and keep my grades up. If I were not swimming, I would be able to get more rest and sleep."
Another swimmer, Trisha Meyerchick, said, "Sometimes swimming does add stress, especially around conference, because not only are you thinking about your school work but you are also thinking about how you will perform in your race. Although overall I do not think that swimming adds a lot of stress because, in a way, after a long day, when I finally get in the pool for practice, I feel good and I feel that I can leave all my problems behind when I swim by working hard. So I would say that swimming lets me release stress and anger."
Student Adam Brown said, "Sometimes teachers add to the stress of student-athletes. For example, when you miss a test because you are gone for a meet, some teachers do not let you make up the tests."
The amount of stress that a student-athlete has depends on the student and on the sport that they are involved in. Ultimately, the student was the one who decided to be involved in the sport.
