Sports vs Education

I think it is a safe bet that if you were to ask people what is more important between sports and education most people would answer education, and that is fantastic! However, what is really more important in America? What we say and what our actions indicate are completely different.

Lets be honest in America sports is more important than education.

Lets take a look at two recent events in the United States:

1) Chicago Teachers Strike

2) NFL Referee Lockout

The American people talked about the referee lockout and got MAD when a bad call by a replacement referee affected the results of a football game. People were downright nasty towards people just trying to do a job that most were probably not ready for in their career. It would be like asking a college freshman QB to start for the NFL and perform like Payton Manning! The results are not going to be good! People make mistakes and even the pro officials make bad calls that affect games in a serious way.

Does anyone remember Ed Hochuli, arguably the NFL's best referee, in 2008 during a game between the San Diego Chargers and the Denver Broncos? His bad call seemingly caused the Chargers to lose the game.

Football isn't the only game where pro officials make significant errors. Does anyone remember Jim Joyce ending Armando Galarraga's bid for a perfect game on the final out of the game? Remember the "Safe" call when the runner was about a foot off the base when Galarraga caught the ball while on the base?

Now lets compare this with the Chicago teachers' strike. The NFL referee lockout helped to cause the Green Bay Packers to lose an extra game. The Chicago teachers' strike kept students out of school. One of the chief reasons for the work stoppage was a pension plan and the refs received public support while the teachers got this:

"There's an attitude that teachers should be glad they have jobs with so many others losing ground," says Peter Cappelli.

Who got their pension? The referees. Who should have gotten a pension? Probably nobody! To quote friend, tweeter, and blogger Joshua Hall (@Splatergrits):

"Pensions are going the way of the dodo bird."

This is very true and there is a good reason for it! Pensions cause businesses and government financial hardships! Just look at the auto industry and pensions in the linked article, they cost too much money.

The moral of the story is that the teachers' got little to no support from the public while the refs benefited from a public outcry. If education is really more important in the minds of people would we support the teachers or would we support the refs?

Excellance not Perfection

Something I have started thinking about recently is whether perfection is an appropriate goal, and at first thought the answer is obvious: YES!!!!!!!

After some thought I am not so sure perfection is the right goal. Lets look at the 1972 Miami Dolphins. This team is famous for being undefeated, superbowl and all. It would be easy to call this team perfect, but they weren't! Their opponents moved the ball forward and even scored against them! In fact in game three, verses the Vikings, they only won by two points! The team even trailed in a few games. It seems to me true perfection would require this team to not allow ANY points or even yards gained by each and every opponent. No, this team wasn't perfect, but they didn't let the little things get in the way of the ultimate goal; WIN EVERY GAME!

Does this seem like an unrealistic definition of perfect? The answer is NO!!!! Perfection is meant to be an unreasonable ideal! In fact if you reach perfection you are probably not challenging yourself enough. I am not discounting the 72' Dolphins. What they did was, remains, and will always be, an incredible accomplishment but it was not perfection. It was a season of excellence.

When one strives to be perfect in school, career, athletics, or anything really, problems and issues will arise, and someone seeking perfection is at much greater risk of anxiety when the litle things prevent perfection. This anxiety causes one to try to eliminate the little problems and issues that arise and we lose sight of the overall goal. Yes the overall may be meant, but it is meant with anxiety, stress, burnout, and you will likely dissatisfy one of more people with your anxiousness and stress.

Now lets look at excellence. Striving for excellence does not require everything go perfect! Striving for excellence allows one to tackle the issues and problems that will come with little stress and worry, because their is no unrealistic ideal weighing on their own expectations, thus one remains focused on the most important parts and, of course, the big picture.

Lets go back to football. If a Quarterback is seeking perfection, but throws an interception, that one mistake could cripple the players focus because he has a perfection ideal that has just been broken. The player runs the risk of getting too upset about one mistake, thus hampering his ability to help his team recover from his error. However, if the same player is focused on excellence, relieving the stress of the ideal, he can stay focused on the new task and help his teammates prevent the opposing player from advancing down the field.

I do not write this post to say that school or other related areas shouldn't be based on grades or similar. Striving for excellence does not give one an excuse to get poor grades, in fact, CONSISTENT poor grades are a sign that a person is not pursuing excellence. What I am talking about is changing our mindset from unrealistic perfection to attainable excellence in the completion of the task at hand, without stressing over the little things.