Cutting in Sports Blog #12

This blog is not directly related to education. My 5th grade son plays hockey on Moorhead. He is a second year squirt. Moorhead has both in-house squirts and travel squirts. Moorhead is a huge hockey town and many of our hockey players have had success in the NHL as well as college. This year it was decided (by who, I don't know) that like every year, our children will try out for their travel teams. BUT, this year, they will be cutting players from travel teams. All players can still do in-house squirts. As a parent and a teacher I have a problem with this. Children experience enough pressure to be their best, have the best things, and look the best at such a young age, do they really need be told in 5th grade that they not good enough to play hockey? There is enough competition and pressure on children in sports when they start middle school, do we need to put that on them in elementary school? I feel that for those students who do get cut, their self esteem will drop also and that could carry over into the classroom for some. I know that if I would have been cut from basketball in 5th grade, I would have been so embarrassed to face anyone a school. I'm not saying that for all those children who are cut from sports that it will effect them negatively, but it will for some. For some, it is there only time they feel a part of something or feel accepted. If children are worried about try out and if they made the team, how does that affect them socially, emotionally, and physically. I know what I was like in high school when we had tryouts our freshman year for basketball. I did not sleep, eat, or wanted to be in school until it was done. I was very nervous; I did make the team and all was fine after the fact.

For my son, I am not worried that he will not make the travel team. He is a player that skates to his line and bounces back between the first and second lines. He has made comments to me about how they are cutting this year and I can tell he is a little upset with the whole thing. He is worried that he may not make the team or one of his friends does not make the team. My son is very sensitive and I worry what this will do for his self esteem. I don't want him to feel that he is a failure if he is cut from the travel team. We have been working with him to believe that he is smart and a good athlete; at times, he will say that he is the dumbest one in his class even though he is very smart (I'm not saying that because he is my son, he has always been in the higher classes and his MAPs and Standards test fit that). I asked him why he feels that he is dumb (I tell both my children that they are smart and to believe in themselves like I do), he said that a boy in his class has been telling him every year that he is so dumb.

OK. here is my question. At work, I drafted a e-mail to one of the main coaches about how I feel about cutting. In a nut shell, I stated that I think that it is wrong to cut our children from sports at such a young age and if they are going to cut, what are they going to do for those players. Are they going to offer clinics that they could attend to help them improve or just let them feel as a failure. I don't want to be "that" parent and have them look at my son and treat him differently, but I don't want our children to feel that they are failures in hockey either.