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Grade 7 and 8 / Junior High athletes should not be playing against High School athletes .
- It is morally wrong, socially wrong and most importantly medically wrong.” Female junior high soccer athletes suffer 40% more concussions then high school age athletes grades 9-12″. Concussions can have tragic consequences ranging from lower academic ability to lifelong neurological conditions and traumatic brain injuries/TBI. “Emergency department visits for concussions sustained during organized team sports doubled among 8-13 year old’s the last 5 years. More than 448,000 children visited hospital emergency departments in 2014 for concussions and other traumatic brain injuries related to sports .”
- The Massachusetts Interscholastic Athletic Association mission is to govern and safe guard student athletes. The MIAA knows all about these alarming statistics but has failed to protect the children and continues to allow Junior High children to play against 16-18 year old high school athletes. These high school athletes could outweigh their junior high competition by over a 100 lbs. No wonder “Concussion rates more than doubled among students age 8-15 participating in sports like soccer and basketball “
Socially most adults agree children age 11-14 should not be hanging out with high school students age 15-18,but having them play on the same teams leads to team sleep over’s and team bonding events outside the athletic fields and gyms. The ironic situations exist where schools ban social interaction between grades 7 and 8 and upper-class students during school hours but encourage the interaction after school when they allow junior high children to participate in high school sports. I saw an 11 year old girl who made the high school basketball team attending team sleep over’s at a 18 year old senior teammates home. Morally having junior high children displace upper-class athletes is also wrong . These upper-class students deserve their chance to play high school sports. Schools that have allowed Junior high students to play high school sports have seen an elimination or reduction in junior high teams, thus fewer opportunity to participate in athletics for all students. Please write or call your school committee members and ask them why they allow junior high students to play high school sports considering how dangerous it is . The answer could be that the high school coaches desire these promising junior high athletes and drool over having them for 6 years ignoring the potential life changing injuries to these children.
Easy solution to this Truck problem which also affects Holyoke Road. The majority of these trucks come from Lanes ! Use Rt. 20 !!! It’s a state road that’s designed to handle the daily wear and tear of larger vehicles.
