In the book Friday Night Lights by H.G. Bissinger, there is the town of Odessa in which the story takes place. This town is considered the “arm pit of Texas” (60) and “a place rooted in the sweet nostalgia of the fifties.” (64) The town is considered to be rooted in the fifties because of its traditional views, leisure activities, and racial views on segregation. It took the town of Odessa a very long time until it completely desegregated the 3 schools in the town. This brought an uproar to the town because many of the white parents believed that this would bring down the main school , Permian, football team’s success. But what they didn’t realize is that this could potentially bring fresh feet, new skill, and great players to their team. At Permian the players are treated like royalty. Each player is basically entitled to overall success and living a royal life. They never have to get their hands dirty unless its on the field. Teachers overlook failing test grades, and girl flock to the sides of jocks granting each wish as their command. Football was the number one priority of Odessa and everyone knew it, “We don’t have a large university that has thirty or forty thousand students in it. We don’t have the art museum that some communities have and are world-renowned. When somebody talks about West Texas, they talk about football.”(27) Why is this okay in this town?
As a viewer looking in on the scenario, you may question why the community is so obsessed with this football team or why more emphasis isn’t placed on the academics of the football team. Bissinger describes this city with so much detail, and makes it important to the reader to know that football is absolutely the number one priority to all of its people. The people of this town acknowledge the fact that academics aren’t as good as other schools, but fail to realize it is due to their own consumption in the sport. The parents, players, and students truly believe that academics have decreased since 1988 because that is when Hispanics and African Americans began attending Permian. Sure the town had eliminated segregation within the schools, but at the same time segregation still existed.
“It had nothing to do with true assimilation of the races and everything to do with
percentages—how many whites, how many blacks, how many browns—little numbers
that could be written down and submitted to a judge as proof that there was no longer any
racism. “There’s no integration,” said Moore. “There is desegregation.” (127)
In the current city we live in, of Dalton, football is also a major attraction to the people. Many high schools are big in competition with each other, they are always looking for ways to better themselves. One thing that differs though from Permian, Dalton still places a high importance on academics. Regardless of how good a certain player is or how well the team is doing in their season, the teachers, staff, and parents still expect their student athletes to perform well in school.
The importance of academics is key to schools. After all, a school is built in order to educate students for further studies in life, and to make them more knowledgeable adults. So why should athletes have to work hard in school and on the field? A good example is given to us in Friday Night Lights. There is a star football player named Boobie Miles who is known all over for his skills and speed. During a scrimmage one day he was injured and couldn’t play for the rest of the season. When it came down to his academics he was not a good performer and was considered to be 2 years behind his peers. Now if the school had placed a higher performance on education, then maybe Miles wouldn’t be left in the position that he was in. No person can take away your knowledge or problem solving skills, but being athletic can always be taken away from a person through injuries. Bissinger explains perfectly through this one quote as to why the people of this town continued to make football their whole lives. “Athletics lasts for such a short period of time. It ends for people. But while it lasts, it creates this make-believe world where normal rules don’t apply.”(50) These players had dreams of making it, dreams of winning, and loved the attention. The parents and community all grew up playing football, as many examples were given in the story where the guardians of these players wanted to live vicariously through their children. This is why so much support was given to the team.
2007 was the last year that Dalton High School won regions, but every single year the football team works hard and strives to get better and better with time. But in the end winning isn’t that important. Winning is not so important, that you neglect your education for it. When you think about the consequences, positive and negative, of winning states, regions, or districts does every thing weigh out in favor or against. For example, does winning a football season, win you a job or career later in life? You could potentially be drafted to play football, or maybe even get a job as a coach, but those chances are slim. Now if you invested time into academics then of course you will be able to land a career later in life. And the scenario here with the best of both worlds could be deciding to work hard in not only school, but to also work hard as an athlete. An example is given to us in the story of a student athlete who not only did well when it came to football, but also when the books needed to be read. Brian Chavez slowly replaced a boy in his position, Don Billingsley, because he all around was a good student athlete. Many colleges now require minimum GPA’s for their student athletes, and requirements and programs that push them to do well in both academics and sports. Support from the schools and the community help students in high school. After all the students at this age are not quite independent from their parents, peers, and adults instructing them. If the attitude of the community and parents changed to make academics important than the players, coaches, and staff would have no choice but to study hard while playing sports.
The overall conclusion to make is that there are many things you have to work hard for at life. And in life sometimes you have to work hard at multiple things at a time, such as working a job while going to college, or if you’re already in your career maybe you have to go to work every day and also work hard for your marriage, or kids in a sport. It is important to make high school students work hard in both their academics and sports. Not only will it teach them to work hard in life but it will also make them better adults in their futures, give them a safety net in case sports don’t work out in the end, and make them accomplish things in life. The positive far outweigh the negative by making student athletes work for career in sports and an education along side it.