Will School Choice Destroy Athletics as We Know It?

Americans love sports, but what happens to athletic programs when democratic public schools close? Privatizing public education, so-called school choice, means drastic changes, as school officials grapple with the effects of school choice legislation.

Communities rally behind high school football in the fall, basketball during the winter, and track and field in the spring. Public schools might offer swimming, soccer, and other sports, critical for helping young people obtain college scholarships. Even though they aren’t easy to obtain, about 180,000 NCAA D1 and D2 student-athletes earn athletic scholarships each year.

School choice, including charter schools, vouchers, homeschooling, and open enrollment, alters who plays sports and undermines community pride in public schools. Defunding public schools ruins sports programs. Which students get access? Will only the wealthiest private schools get sports?

In 2023, West Virginia headlined How lawmakers helped ruin high school football in West Virginia reflecting on game “blowouts” in that state. When private schools corral all the best players, it changes the competition. It also makes for boring games. Brooke High Coach Mac McLean, whose team always struggled in the AAA class, said it’s only going to get worse: The rich will get richer and the poor will get poorer.

School choice crusaders seem not to have thought through what happens with sports. Olivia Nutter recently wrote in Athletics Directors 411:

Proponents of school choice argue that parents should be free to choose what’s best for their children, including athletic opportunities. But that freedom raises difficult questions about fairness and competitive balance. If top talent continually migrates to a handful of programs, the very structure of high school sports could change, creating a system where access to success depends less on effort and more on ZIP code flexibility.

Consider that between 2010–11 and 2021–22, 4,000+ public secondary schools closed due to declining enrollment, unaffordable housing, lower birth rates, and an overall defunding of public education by school privatizers seeking to create schools for profit.

Parental school choice is also deceptive. Private schools, not parents, ultimately choose students. Gifted athletes will likely be welcome at a private school that prioritizes sports. Wealthy private school teams will compete with other private schools, but what about students who never got swept up in the choice program, never got identified in their poor charter schools, or in their homeschools?

Undiscovered students who haven’t yet shown their prowess in sports may not have the opportunity to do so, relegated to a fledgling public school that has lost its resources, a charter school, or homeschool, where they remain unrecognized. What if they never get the opportunity to practice sports under the eyes of a good coach?

Charter schools often lack the budget or incentive to offer quality sports programs. Sports facilities, football fields, tracks, or access to swimming pools is costly. Some may rent facilities or partner with community organizations for practice, but this can be expensive.

States like Florida allow charter school and homeschool students (7.d) to participate in traditional public school sports, but this is controversial. It dismisses the community school pride factor, a significant all-American feature of school sports. If parents don’t want their child at that public school, take tax dollars elsewhere; why get the advantage of a public school sports program? What happens when the school ultimately closes?

Missouri is another state that permits homeschool students to participate in public education sports.

Students might also leave public school sports programs for sports clubs, which have become synonymous with college recruitment across areas, though in football, they appear less so.

Athletic organizations see the problems with school choice. Both the Oklahoma Secondary School Activities Association (OSSAA) and the Alabama High School Athletic Association (AHSAA) ran into difficulties with their states choice programs.

As one parent puts it:

Private schools often have access to resources that public schools do not – such as better facilities, more experienced coaches or even the ability to attract top talent through scholarships. This creates an uneven playing field during playoff competitions. According to a study by The Atlantic (2013), private high school students are over twice as likely as public school students to reach Division I college sports.

Some private schools are small and also lack resources, but will be expected to compete against wealthier private schools.

School board members in Hamilton, Tennessee, voiced concern that the state’s Education Freedom Scholarship, allowing students to attend private schools, siphons desirable athletes from public schools. They worry about a drop in public school attendance, likely related to the school choice program. Sports success skews toward wealthier super schools, leaving fewer high school teams for competition.

Texas exemplifies the problems school choice creates for sports, especially when parents nostalgically remember when they attended those public schools. At 2.22 on the video below they discuss how football, basketball, and track, public school sports programs beloved in that state, could be affected. It might mean laying off school coaching staff.

Cultural overemphasis and concerns about sports injuries leave critics to advocate for the end of school sports altogether. But athletics are an ingrained American tradition, and it’s hard to see public schools successfully survive without vibrant sports and extracurricular programs.

Sports aren’t only about making future successful athletes, of course. Students benefit physically and mentally, and team sports promote positive socialization and all around good health. Students learn how to win gracefully, build confidence, but also how to lose and accept defeat without always quitting.

But if public education is fully privatized, once unimaginable, public school sports could end. Most Americans are not on board for school choice and want to see better and more support of public schooling. The loss of sports might be added in as a reason to reject school choice. It may be time for pushback and Americans rallying around their democratic public schools. Could it be?

Consider Mississippi where football in small towns is called “the fabric of the community.” Parents worried about their public schools, and the Mississippi legislature recently killed the school choice bill which would have sent public school funding to private schools.

Maybe there’s hope, not only for school sports, team building, but for democratic public schools. Perhaps we’ll soon see a public school renaissance and a great refocus on the greatness of our country and its children and their schools, not only with sports but learning. Now that’s truly a winning idea!