[davidthefat]

I am have this dilemma: whether to finish football my senior year, or to drop and focus solely on academics and robotics. I have been contemplating for a month or two; I already told my counsellor, robotics mentor and my football coach that this year would be my last season. When my friends found out, I started having second thoughts. They asked me why I was going to do it; my first response was I never gotten my art credit, and I wanted to do 4 AP classes. Now on top of that I also wanted to focus 100% of my time on robotics and academics. Now I heard from another friend not in football that the robotics class really has nothing to do with what the team does, so I am not so sure about that aspect. My last reason was that Football just took up too much of my time; 3 hours of practice every day, that itself took its toll on my body and academics. I am not sure if it is feasible to pull off A's in 4 AP classes next year while I can only pull off B's in only 2 this year. Seems like a waste of 3 years in football to not play the 4rth. I have convinced myself that I won't be playing in college, but I am having serious second thoughts. I wanted to intern/do a summer program at Caltech or JPL during this coming up summer, that will not be possible with summer practice. Now that being said: both seem like a lose lose situation for me. Senior year will not affect my college stuff.

I really want to prepare for college even if the AP classes I will take my senior year will not affect my chances of going into college, but the knowledge and the experience gained in AP classes are priceless. So are the Friday Night Lights of Varsity football. I really want to leave a legacy on the robotics team next year, train up the programmers, even leave a deeper legacy. I have told a guy I knew who also took the route of dropping football his senior year and taking on solely academics (he was good too, starting center) he says he somewhat regrets not being able to play friday nights and seemed like a waste of 3 years. Now if I can find a way to balance all that it would be perfect, but I find that doing homework after practice is pretty hard. I guess I will talk it over with my counsellor and mentor and coach about it more. It really is a hard choice to make.

My mentality has always been finish what you started. Finish that drive, finish that block, finish that tackle. Now I am faced with this dilemma, I really feel like a deer in the head lights right now. Maybe I was acting too emotionally before when I said I was going to drop for sure. Hell yes football is fun, also is robotics.