How To Play Happy Wheels At School?

Should I pull my 12 yr old from regular school so she can play more tennis?

• Our daughter attends a Catholic school entering the 7th grade in September. Her school is k-8 . She trains at a Youth Tennis school 4 days a week for 3 hours after her regular school , and gets a private lesson once a week and on weekends plays in different tournaments. She is starting to play Open level tournaments. Occasionally still likes Satellites. My concern is that for the last 6-7 months she tells my husband and I that she no longer wants to attend her little catholic school because no one understands her passion for tennis. She tells us that all her friends are at her tennis school she goes to after school. She has been investigating on line and with some other tennis students who are nationally ranked that attend independent study schools. Some kids at her tennis school are home schooled or involved in a independent study program. My daughter tells us that we need to start training her more hours during the day so she can be recognized at a higher level in preparation for College. She tells us that if we don't start her in a all day training tennis program it will be to late when she reaches high school. Our daughter has been playing since 8 years old. She is a very good tennis player but is beginning to worry us that she will be missing an important academic program where we have her. I have spoken to different parents whose children also play tennis and I am getting a mix of answers and people who are not involved in tennis think that we are crazy parents . But honestly we don't force our daughter to play a lot of tennis. This all comes from her. She has tried swim team and even had a passion to ride horses, but at the end of the day she rather play tennis. As parents we just don't know if we should pull her out of her Catholic School she attends and start her on a independent study program that would allow her to train at her tennis school more hours. Our dream as parents was to have her finish her primary years at her Catholic School that ends in the 8th grade, then we wanted her to pick a Catholic High School and perhaps play high school tennis, but she feels High School Tennis isn't that strong and she is already thinking she needs to train full time so she can qualify to attend and play for a really good University, or play on the Pro Circuit. I don't want to burst her bubble and her motivation but I would be so happy if she just finishes school and attends a good University on a Tennis Scholarship. Under some stress here trying to decide to pull her out of regular school. She tells us she would get more accomplished in an independent Academic program instead of regular school with recesses, snacktime, lunch time and classes that she isn't interested in. Do you think its's a good idea to pull her from regular school, and have her play more tennis during the day ? We have spoken to some professional tennis coaches who all think this is the way to go. Fear is playing a huge role here. I don't want her to grow up and later tell us she wasn't given the opportunity to play tennis at a higher level.

• Answer:

  I think it really depends how good she is. Is she nationally ranked for her age? Is she doing well in these tournaments she's entering? If not, I wouldn't personally throw away her education for the sake of her sport. Passion's necessary to make it to the top of any sport...but it isn't sufficient. If there are five kids her age at her tennis school with more talent than her, she's not going to make it as a pro and she will need to have had a decent education to fall back on. Which you _can_ give her through independent study, of course. But just doing the bare minimum to scrape through her classes, avoiding subjects she doesn't like, and playing tennis all the rest of the time won't do it.