“Extracurricular Activities and Social Capital”
Article by Chad Bryant
Description:
When we were first given the topic of social capital, we didn’t know what it actually meant, but through research we learned that social capital is the positive connections you make with people. So once we figured out what it is, we had to develop a project that addressed social capital and how it effected youth. We decided to study the impact of extracurricular activities on youth’s social capital.
We looked at all types of activities such as sports, music, the arts, clubs, and just any activity you do outside of the classroom, including those through your school. Through our research we noticed the positive benefits of extracurricular participation, and the risk factors that lead to a lack of participation. The benefits to students who participate in extracurricular activities are:
- They are less likely to drop out of school
- They connect better with students of different backgrounds
- They are less likely to be adjudicated
- They are more invested in a given cause, and
- They are more satisfied with their school experience
The risk factors that create a lack of extracurricular involvement are:
- Generational poverty
- Single-parent homes/no biological parents in the household
- Physical handicaps
- Special education
- Extended “latchkey” after school time
- Retention in school, and
- Recent death or serious illness in immediate family.
After determining the different risk factors and benefits, we had to find a way to test it. We decided to do a survey. We used the Early Adolescent Resilience Survey as an outline and came up with the rest of it on our own. We decided to conduct our survey at four different YMCA summer camp programs. Before issuing the survey, we came up with two hypotheses. The first was that youth participation in extracurricular activities increases their chances for social capital gain by promoting positive social development. The second hypothesis was that there are various factors which contribute to the likelihood of youth’s positive social development.
We administered 120 surveys to adolescents between 6th and 10th grade. We found that as school performance (grades) decreased, average social capital and extracurricular quality decreased (p<.05). Additionally, Students who repeated a grade had lower average social capital than those who did not repeat a grade (p<.05). The correlation was that as extracurricular quality increased, social capital increased (p<.05). From this our conclusions were that certain risk factors affect social capital and extracurricular quality, education affects social capital and extracurricular quality, and that extracurricular quality affects social capital.
Finally we recommend that a way to ensure universal opportunity be found through financial aid, marketing and more programs for the disabled. It would also be beneficial to increase the quality of programs and hire trustworthy instructors a for the purpose of creating a healthy environment for peer interaction.
Funding for Academic Year: 2004