USA HOCKEY PARENTS' ASSOCIATION

By Warren Stevens

When Zack and Sam Johnson announced that they wanted to sign up to play ice hockey in the fall of 2006, parents Sally and Kevin were concerned.

"For a number of reasons," said Sally recently. "But we were mostly concerned about their grades. We had two outstanding students with great study skills and we didn't want to jeopardize that."

So they made a pact with their sons - with a bit of incentive if they held up their part of the bargain. Now as the Johnson family heads toward its second hockey season this fall, their concerns have all but faded.

"Zack and Sam knew the deal going in," said their father Kevin. "School first. Hockey second. And as long and their grades and school work didn;t suffer, we were all for it. Now we're hooked."

While the 2007-08 hockey season is still more than 100 days away for Zack (age 10) and Sam (age 8), they won't have to wait that long before getting on the ice again. In July, they will be attending their first-ever sleep-over hockey camp at Phillips Exeter Academy in Exeter, NH - a reward of sorts for keeping their promise.

By Andrea L. Manning, Ph.D.

Reading, writing and rinks. Hockey has a proud heritage of supporting higher education in pursuit of athletic and academic excellence.

From the time you laced up your first pair of skates, your parents told you, “No homework, no hockey.” From Mites to Midgets, good grades have always been a prerequisite to playing good hockey. The same is true at the high school and collegiate levels, where what you do on the ice hinges on how well you’ve done in the classroom.

The 1980 U.S. “Miracle on Ice” Team was made up of college kids who learned about life and hockey at some of this country’s finest academic institutions. Facing the Russians was nothing after having to write a 20-page term paper on the Russian revolution, or cramming for a calculus test.

As we count-down the final days of school this year, it’s a good time for players of all ages and skill levels to reflect on the year just past and set lofty goals and high ideals both on the ice and in the classroom for next fall. The two go together like scoring goals and flashing red lights, but education should always be on the first line of your priorities.

In a recent study of NCAA student-athletes, ice hockey players were the top-ranked students in terms of GPA for all male athletes. The study went on to say that "it was believed that parents played a major role in establishing early study patterns and placing education above any sport."

The same study went on to point out that - regardless of the sport - student-athletes routinely perform better academically than more than 50 percent of students in the general population.

The fact is that very few who ever lace up a pair of hockey skates will ever make it to the NHL. Even those who do make it to the pros know that a hockey career can be over in a fleeting moment, but that an education lasts a lifetime.