A few days ago a Buzzfeed headline caught my eye as Lebron James may become the first NBA ‘200M Man.’ Wow. 200 million USD for a five year deal, and that isn't even including the outside professional sponsorships. Well, this had me interested, and it turns out that Jeff Daniels was wrong when he said in HBO’s Newsroom that “we lead the world in only three categories: the number of incarcerated citizens per-capita, the number of adults who believe angels are real, and defense spending.” He missed a big one. According to the Forbes List of Highest Paid Athletes, the United States lays claim to six of the top ten highest paid athletes. Only three other countries even have two athletes in the top 50 (England, Spain and The Dominican Republic) when the U.S. holds 32 of the positions. On the whole list of 100, we lay claim to 65 of the highest paid athletes who are all paid over 20 million United States Dollars annually.
Jeff Daniels goes further to show the fact the the United States is not even close to the most educated country. He suggests that we are “seventh in literacy, 27th in math, 22nd in science.” Another source, Fair Reporters, reports the United States coming in 29th for science and math at the 15 year old age group. It is astounding that a nation that spends so much time and money encouraging athletes seems to have neglected a critical area: education.
A few things happen in this process. First, as Sir Kenneth Robinson suggests, the United States Education system is not up to the times. Unfortunately, there is not an overwhelming initiative to change it. Somehow, educational appeal is lost and I think that this is a result of the overpressure for America to excel in athletics.
Robinson isn’t alone in this critique. Paulo Freire and John Taylor Gatto jump in to suggest that this ‘banking model’ is not working and that education has actually begun to cripple students and teachers alike. Second, students quickly get the feeling that school is simply preparing them for jobs that are already in place instead of inspiring a drive to learn new things and discover uncharted territories.
Lastly, it is my opinion that the drive for sports in America is part of the reason why some students detest school so much. American children are told that if they work hard enough, they have the opportunity to become professional athletes. This is great and everything except that it is becoming the main priority while academia falls behind. Maybe the millions and even billions of superfluous dollars spent towards athletics could be used more wisely for some other cause (one place might be education reform).
On the cusp of the Olympic Games, the United States is sports-crazed. Education simply does not seem to be a priority for America when the entertainment value of sports is driven higher and higher. Perhaps it is time to take the attention away from the NFL, NBA and MLB and turn it towards America’s education system that is dearly in need of help. Other countries are doing a much better job of balancing education as a priority rather than encouraging students to only look towards sports. Wouldn’t it be greater to boast about our education system than our athletics on a national scale?
