The Culture of School Sports

April 1, 2016

What is our greatest asset in school sports?

If your answer is the kids, or the long hours devoted to teaching them by low-paid staff, it would be hard to argue.

But my answer for the greatest asset – the unique strength we have, our edge, our advantage? It is the culture of school sports.

We have marching bands and homecomings, which non-school youth sports do not have.

We have pep assemblies and pep bands and spirit weeks, which non-school youth sports lack.

We have letter jackets, spectator buses, cheerleaders and pompon squads which are missing from most non-school youth sports programs.

On a Friday night in the fall or winter in most parts of Michigan, I can find several high school games on the radio. I can find competing high school score and highlight shows on TV after the local news. Never is any of this found for non-school youth sports.

On Saturday mornings in the fall or winter, there are dozens of radio talk shows with local high school coaches reviewing the previous game and previewing the next. Never is this a part of non-school youth sports.

On radio, television and daily and weekly newspapers all school year long, I can find “High School Teams of the Week.” Rarely, if ever, is there a non-school youth sports team of the week.

School sports enjoy a standing in our communities and a status in our local media that non-school sports can’t come close to. The AAU and travel teams are a culture that disses the school and community. Ours is a culture that defines the school and community.

We are local, amateur, inexpensive and educational; and we have almost everything going for us. We need to promote and protect these things – the culture of school sports.

Lost in Time

August 25, 2015

So, North Korea is establishing its own unique time zone – “Pyongyang time” – named after the nation’s capital city. North Korea will fall 30 minutes behind Japan whose time zone was imposed on the entire Korean peninsula more than 100 years ago.

Actually, North Korea is more than 30 years behind Japan in almost every aspect of civilized life.

This time zone adjustment gesture is of little practical significance because North Koreans have been closed off from global interaction by the impositions of their brutal dictators since the end of World War II. It’s symbolism befitting the backward nation’s isolationism.

The negative effects of this isolationism upon the nation are visible across the Demilitarized Zone from South Korea. Behind visitors to the DMZ is the vibrant mega-city of Seoul, South Korea. Across the river is a bleak, barren landscape with no sign of life. No people, no agriculture. Just a few buildings, without inhabitants. Built only for show.

There are many lessons to be learned from this contrast, on many levels. Of course, we see how people thrive more in an atmosphere of freedom than totalitarianism. We see the benefits of engagement over isolationism. We see that symbols without substance are meaningless.

Lessons for nations, to be sure. But reminders for enterprises of all kinds, including ours.

And a note to North Korea ... Newfoundland Island has had its own time zone for many years. It’s 30 minutes ahead of the rest of North America, and a century ahead of North Korea.