High school is supposed to be the best time of your life. One gets to experience prom, trips, big sporting events, and everything in-between. But, sometimes students play sports or have a job, and add that extra responsibility on for themselves. This can be hard to balance, but The Stampede is here to help. The Stampede was able to talk to a couple students, one working and one doing sports, to get some insight on just how to balance school with extracurricular activities.

Kimberly Wilsoncroft is a junior here at CAJSHS who works at a local grocery store. She takes advanced classes and is in the enrichment program here at our school. Kimberly also is in the associate’s program, meaning she will graduate high school with an associate’s degree, which she pays for with the money she earns by working at the grocer.

Kimberly works anywhere from 25-30 hours a week. Kimberly said she chose to work while in high school “as a way to have a sense of independence, and also to support myself to take the burden off of my family a little bit.” Kimberly has been working since her sophomore year, so she knows some ways to balance school and work.

Kimberly says that time management is key! As Kimberly states: “I take advantage of every bit of free time that I have. Also, if I am on my break at work, I use that time to study for a test I have the next day on Quizlet, or just something small like that. It may sound small or silly, but it can help greatly.” Kimberly also said that balancing school and work is tough, but it can be done. It gets a bit stressful when she has a lot of homework and causes her to lose some sleep, but Kimberly is working on being better this school year.

What can we take from speaking to Kimberly? Time management is the key to having a job and still getting homework done. One needs to take advantage of all the time they can get! On breaks and maybe when there’s no customers, one can use Quizlet to study or something similar. Now, let’s look at another perspective; someone who does sports through the school.

Elliot Thorp is a senior here at CAJSHS. He is a swimmer for our swim team and trains 21 hours a week, or 3 hours a day, Monday-Saturday. Elliot understands just how hard balancing school and sports can be; but he is able to balance it with one specific technique.

Elliot says the key to balancing school and sports is to be “proactive”. Elliot explains just why this works: “I know everyone says to avoid procrastinating, but they say it because it’s true. Especially when you are in a sport, once you fall behind it’s almost impossible to catch up, which is why you need to stay on top of everything.”

Elliot gets 6 hours of sleep a night, which in all honesty, is good for someone who trains as much as he does. Elliot is able to sleep this much because he is proactive; something that we can all take away from him. Do not procrastinate and stay on top of things and balancing school with a sport will be much easier.

So, what should you, the reader, take away from this article? Be proactive, don’t procrastinate, and manage your time well. By doing these three things, you can be successful balancing school with an extracurricular activity.