News & Information

The Importance of Youth Sports
National Youth Sports Week is July 20-24, 2020

Many kids and adults love to play sports either competitively or just for fun. Sometimes the love for a sport can last someone's entire life and can be traced back to their childhood. The memories they have of bonding with teammates, winning their first medal, or just eating their favorite candy on the sideline can live with someone forever.

Playing sports as a child can teach you important skills that are essential to becoming a successful adult, in addition, youth who participate in cardio exercise often do better academically (Gil-Espinosa FJ, Chillón P, Fernández-García JC, Cadenas-Sanchez C. 2020).

Playing sports can teach youth:

• How to listen. The willingness to learn among children who play sports is greater than that of children who did not play sports (Reverdito RS, Galatti LR, Carvalho HM, et al., 2017).
• Hard work.
• How to accept criticism from someone and how they can use that information to better themselves.
• How to work together to achieve a single goal, while settling differences among themselves along the way.
• Time management.

Sports make children overall healthier people. Strenuous physical activity is an important part of staying healthy. Many sports involve running, lifting, hitting, or some other kind of exercise. A study done in Hong Kong in 2017 found that students or children who participated in positive youth development sport mentorship programs had an overall improved mental health, improved physical fitness, and an increased level of physical activity (Ho FKW, Louie LHT, Wong WH, et al.). These healthy habits can follow you into adulthood. Adults who participated in youth sports as a child were two times more likely to have three or four healthy habits compared to those who did not play a youth sport (Palomäki S, Hirvensalo M, Smith K, et al., 2018).

Recently youth sports have faced a new obstacle, COVID-19, which has greatly changed the way these sports function. Although many are very excited to get back to playing, there are many rules and guidelines parents, kids, and coaches now have to follow. These are in place to ensure the safety of everyone involved.

Youth sports are an important part of the community for the players, coaches, and parents. They have been shown to not only provide families with fun, but help children to become well-rounded and healthy individuals.