While club sports have become a popular pastime for both students and college recruiters, there is still a lot to be said for playing for your high school team. According to Unigo, students who participate in high school sports learn the benefit of representing their community on the field. These athletes learn the fun of team rivalries and revel in the praise of a job well done for their school. This feeling of community and the honor of representing the home team may run over into college athletics if the student advances in his sport as well. Football is more than just a game; it teaches lessons that the players carry with them long after they've hung up their cleats. Teamwork, discipline, perseverance, goal-setting, handling success and failure, time management, and keeping fit. Seeing boys wanting to play football on the field during lunch sparked an idea, A DSOA Jaguars football team! Participating in a sport can help students build on their self-confidence by learning to trust their own abilities, talents, and judgment. By building your image in sports, you also improve your personal value, which directly impacts your self-esteem. We all would like a football team at DSOA to give us a more “normal” high school experience and to add to the fun activities at dreyfoos (Like Homecoming).   Clearly, sports can help you reach your fitness goals and maintain a healthy weight. However, they also encourage healthy decision-making such as not smoking and not drinking. Sports also have hidden health benefits such as lowering the chance of osteoporosis or breast cancer later in life. In fact, playing sports helps students relax and reduce their anxiety. Besides just being fun, sports can help you perform better in school, relax more and worry less, deal with setbacks, work better with others and increase your energy — all of which helps you balance school and everything else going on in your life. Why Are Sports Important? Sports are beneficial for both a child's mental and physical well-being. Not only can sports help to strengthen bones and tone muscles, but they can also help children improve their academic performance and teach them the value of teamwork. Let’s make this happen, Go Jaguars!