The BILA Wave

By: Nissi Ofosu & Janelle Prudhomme

The start of the new academic year comes with the beginning of the new sports season at Wingate Educational Campus. However, managing your studies and everything else might be hard when our academic lives often take priority over our lives outside of school. Also, anything going on personally, not just academically.

It stresses out student-athletes as well as regular students.  Sports-related students might find it challenging to balance their studies and schoolwork with practice and games, which can later on interfere with their grades and can put them on a hiatus from the sport they are playing. But I also know that many athletes don’t want to have to take a pause from playing a sport they love but at the same time school could be stressful. 

Jabez Primus, a senior athlete in BILA participating in both soccer this fall and track in the spring had a little to say on this topic. Having a related occurrence with this certain situation, his grades began to drop and he had to take a break from track to focus on what was more important. 

“Coming home everyday after practice I was tired. It was a lot of work and as I already said before, I got so tired to the point where I didn’t want to pick up my computer and do work. I’ll say I’ll do it the next day.”

Which is how a lot of athletes may feel coming home everyday after practice. But if you really want to be involved in a sport then doing the work is better than not doing it. Most importantly, being backed up on work is worse than not being able to participate in extracurricular activities. Which is something that Jabez also realized. 

“But I figured, hey, if I’m gonna keep doing this then I also have to put in the work. On and off the field. So I figured out how to make time to do both.” 

But not only can academics be difficult but also the sport itself. It can also be quite draining mentally and physically. Causing you to sometimes overthink things about yourself and others. 

“As a basketball player I was comparing myself to other basketball players you know. But I  learned that comparing yourself..you can’t compare yourself to nobody because everybody is different and everybody’s abilities and skills that others don’t have,” said Polyte Morgan, a junior attending HSPS at Wingate and a player on Wingate’s Boys Basketball Team. 

Sometimes you may feel that way but it’s always important to realize that no matter what, it doesn’t matter if someone is better than you. What matters is putting in the work to become better. 

But also, with sports being such a competitive activity, the losses can sometimes be hard for athletes. Losses can sometimes be hard for athletes to handle, but they have no choice to get through it and keep pushing through. 

“…certain losses are harder to overcome than others. Certain losses, you can just go to bed and not really think about it, others it’s harder, but you just need to wake up the next day and keep it pushing because you can’t dwell on the past,” said Hasani Thomas, a senior attending BILA at Wingate and a player on Wingate’s Boys Basketball Team.

Losing is something that everybody, no matter who you are, will go through. It should only teach you how to want to do better and build on the past. 

Though sports may have its down parts to it, students should get themselves involved in sports. It gives students the opportunity to meet new people and try something new. 

Stanicia John, a Junior who attends BILA and manager for both the Track Team and Girls basketball, addressed that she saw sports as an opportunity to meet new people. 

“I didn’t really know a lot of people around the school so I figured getting into a sport or extra curricular activity would help me meet people and it actually did.” 

You can meet people with the same interests and personality as you. Especially for incoming freshmen or sophomores who just haven’t found their thing yet. It’s important to put yourself out there even though sometimes it may be confining. 

But don’t forget, even though being an athlete may sound tough at times, it still has its advantages and you should still go and try out!