Amanda Ripley's The Case Against High School Sports
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Amanda Ripley argues in her essay, “The Case Against High School Sports,” that allowing sports in high schools is the reason students in America are scoring far lower on standardized tests than students in other countries (Para. 4). In her analysis, Ripley covers both the causes and effects of this problem, arguing that America should take sports out of high schools in order to score at the same level as the academically top-ranked countries (Para. 39). Ripley’s argument, while compelling, has many logical fallacies and fails to provide sufficient evidence.
Ripley begins by stating that while there are benefits that come with school sports, she believes they do more harm than good (Para. 7). The main damage caused by sports is to the test scores. She believes that because American schools have sports, they put forth all of their money toward sports. They drop teaching standards to acquire coaches as well as having higher teacher-student ratios in the class than on the field. The principals of these schools are valuing athletics over academics and they are finally just having to close because of academic failure.…show more content… Most of the essay focuses on the Premont Independent School District in Texas. The district was facing shut down due to financial mismanagement and academic failure. After cutting many teachers and closing buildings, the district finally chose to suspend all sports. The school benefited in a drop in student fights, teacher raises, higher passing rates, and academics improvement. After receiving $400,000 from other communities throughout Texas, the district was not shut down and was able to bring back many sports, excluding football. Ripley also supports her claim with some examples of colleges with problems similar to that of the Premont Independent School