Balancing act

It's not easy being a student athlete. Unlike regular students, student athletes not only have to maintain their grades, they have to put in extra time to participate in sports. For elite student athletes, like those honoured recently at the Digby Sports Hall of Fame, it's a balancing act of maintaining their marks while performing at a high level, an act that requires more than a little support.

Some students are able to excel at both, while others are forced to choose between them, sometimes leaving school to concentrate on athletics. A choice that normally doesn’t work.

During the Oct. 20 Digby Sports Hall of Fame ceremonies, Arnold McCallum shared his story with those gathered. Achieving local notoriety for his feats on the ball field and in the rink, in more recent history he’s been the caretaker of the community’s sporting history.

"These kids stayed in school to do what I didn't realize,” said McCallum. “When I got 24, 25 years old. I went back to school. I was the old man of the school at that time."

He said people need to recognize how special student athletes are and applauded current and former standouts for what they've accomplished.

"Keep in mind that the school is as important as their sports," said McCallum. “Being something where they’re not only athletes, but good students at school.”

Making things more difficult for rural students is the need to travel greater distances than their urban counterparts just to get to school, and then travel more to get to competitions. Along with training, it doesn’t leave much time for academics and that means support from those around is mandatory.

"My parents have been amazing," says Anne Balser, currently in her second year as a student athlete at the University of Victoria. "If it wasn't for them I probably wouldn't even be here, out west, playing golf."

She grew up in a family where golf was second nature, playing since her mother taught her the basics at the age of seven. Since then, the duo has teamed up for multiple mother-daughter provincial titles and Anne was recently named to the Digby Sports Hall of Fame as its 2007 female athlete of the year.

While still in high school, she played basketball and softball in addition to golf, but still had to perform on the academic side. If practice or competition took her away from school, she said her teachers were a lot more understanding.

"I found high school a lot easier to get caught up," said Balser. "I found the teachers cared more. If you missed class they would be more concerned with you catching up."

Now in university, the competition is fiercer - and so is the travel. Although the golf team is limited to four or five tournaments per semester, most of their events have been at U.S. schools. After the Christmas break, there will be more tournaments south of the border, but Balser said the schedule is already having an impact on her marks.

"They're okay, I'm passing, but it's kind of hard to do homework on the road," she said. "Catching up is the tough part. Here you have to stay up late to finish assignments. You can tell your professor, but when there's a class of 200, they can't just worry about one."