You might be thinking sports and online school don’t mix. After all, there are a lot of things to think about: Where can I play sports, can I still go to college, etc.
What you might not know is that online school is actually a better option for many competitive student athletes.
How Can I Play Sports and Do Online School?
If you go to school online, you can still participate in sport’s teams at your local public school. This depends on the school’s policy, but the many schools in Arizona allow “home schooled” (including online students) to participate on their sports team. You will have to try out and make the team, but it’s a possibility.
You can also join a club sport, and that’s where online school has greater benefits.
Club sports, traveling teams, competitive leagues, they are all time-demanding extracurricular activities. And depending how competitive, you may need to spend many hours practicing each day. When you’re expected to be in a school building seven hours a day, balancing your life can be stressful.
Online high school allows you to work around your schedule. You could wake up extra early to exercise, do coursework, go to team practice and come back to study. Or you could wake up early and do schoolwork then spend the rest of your day in practice. Either way, online school works with your schedule.
For the College-Bound Athlete: NCAA Approved Online School
You certainly can! You will need to make sure the school is NCAA approved. That is the only way you can be guaranteed to earn a college athletic scholarship.
Primavera just happens to be NCAA approved. This is largely due to our personalized instruction model, which you can learn more about here.
In fact, below are a few stories of Primavera’s student athletes who successfully participated on competitive teams and graduated from Primavera with high GPAs.
Primavera Online High School Student Athletes
Meghan Lyall, Tennis Player
Meghan is a Utah State University student. She was captain of the Aggie women’s tennis team last year, and serves on the Student Athletic Advisory Committee (SAAC).
“I first started playing tennis when I was eleven years old,” said Meghan. “I fell in love with tennis because you can play it for a lifetime.”
With all the traveling and constant practicing required, Meghan needed to have a flexible schedule that only online school could provide.
“I could not have pursued my
tennis career the way I did without attending high school online,” said Meghan. “I was able to do all the traveling and pursue any opportunities that came my way because I could take my school with me anywhere I went.”
Despite her traveling, Meghan worked hard and earned a 4.0 GPA while at Primavera, thanks to the help from her teachers.
“I found that Primavera offered me the flexibility I needed with my schooling, but the easily accessible help that I got from my teachers is really what benefitted me the most,” said Meghan. “I had a hard time learning some of the material in my pre-calculus class in my senior year. My math teacher, Mr. Joshi, was willing to open up live lesson portals once a week to help me with whatever homework problems I did not understand and walk me through each step. I felt like he cared that I really learned the material and wanted to prepare me as best as he could for the quizzes and tests.”
Hannah Potter, Professional Ballerina
Hannah is now graduated and is a professional ballerina for Grand Rapids Ballet. She started her career with Phoenix Ballet at just 16 years old.
“I began taking ballet classes when I was five years old. By the time I was eight I decided that this is what I really loved to do and wanted to spend all my time at the studio taking classes. I had an amazing ballet teacher who was a professional ballerina in Russia,” said Hannah.
That encouragement helped Hannah focus on following her dream, but soon enough, things got a little tricky.
“As I progressed in ballet there came a time when I needed to spend up to six hours a day at the studio and needed to travel for international competitions and auditions in order to further my goals. However, with so much of my day spent in classes and time spent doing homework in the evenings; it would not be possible to do both,” says Hannah.
Her parents decided traditional school would no longer work and began looking for other options for Hannah and found Primavera.
“ I had opportunity to fulfill my dream of becoming a professional dancer happened when I was offered a contract to join a ballet company as their youngest member,” said Hannah. “Thanks to the flexibility of Primavera I was able to pursue that opportunity and finish high school at the same time. I am so extremely happy and excited for my future!”
Justine Callis, Gymnast
For more information on Primavera’s NCAA approval, head here.
ENROLL WITH PRIMAVERA HERE
- Are you an athlete? Share with us the sports you like to play in the comments below!
Does a student athlete have to play for their local high school or can they choose any Arizona high school to play for?
Hi, Jeremy. Thanks for the question. 🙂 You could look into playing for your local high school, or you would most likely sign up for a club team.
My son is a golfer (13 yrs old) and he’s very accomplished at his sport. He’s one of the best in the state under age 13, and he goes to a brick and mortar private school (in Hawaii). As much as we can he also competes at private and state tournaments in Hawaii. However, we’re considering putting him in Online school permanently not just for the safety, these days, but also he does better than at a brick and mortar school… personality related. But since he’s an athlete and he needs regular tournaments, I am afraid that when he gets old enough to compete at high school levels (Varsity, etc), he’ll be online and may be told that he can’t be on a high school team, which does increase his visibility with college scouts in the future. My question is, am I limiting my sons ability to go to a good college by placing him in Online school? Is brick an morter the only way for him to go to college with an athletic scholarship? Or is there a way for him to compete with local high schools in an open forum from Primavera school… or any other online school for that matter? Because only competing in very expensive state and national tournaments is very difficult and if he’s not the absolute best all the time, he may not get as much visibility as we’d like! Thank you for your time.
Can a student athlete pick any High School they want to play for?
Hi, Seiba. You would have to play for the school you attend, or possibly have permission to participate in your home school athletics.
My grandson isn’t doing very well in high school but since the covid outbreak and he had to do online studies his grades have improved he does a lot better job at school when he gets to do it online but he is desires to get a scholarship to college with his baseball skills he lives in Napa Idaho and he needs to find this online school that allows him to do sports at the same time
Hi, Linda. For Idaho, we recommend checking out iSucceed Virtual Schools. They are NCAA approved, so your son can still participate in college sports just fine! The teachers are awesome there as well. Head here or give them a call at 208.908.6250. 🙂