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This article analyzes data from the National Educational Longitudinal Study of 1988 to test the effect of participation in extracurricular activities on high school achievement. It also explores potential mediating mechanisms that link such participation to academic success. The results show that participation in some activities improves achievement, while participation in others diminishes achievement. Participation in interscholastic sports promotes students' development and social ties among students, parents, and schools, and these benefits explain the positive effect of participation on achievement.
American schools are under increasing public pressure to improve students' achievement. Extracurricular programming, particularly school sports, is one of the most widespread and costly practices in our educational system, yet there is relatively little scientific information on the potential academic benefits of the extracurriculum. Does participating in sports or other activities promote higher achievement? Longitudinal studies on school sports have suggested that such participation raises students` grades and test scores (Feigin 1994; Hanson and Kraus 1998, 1999). However, the literature has overwhelmingly focused on sports, largely ignoring participation in other types of activities (Holland and Andre 1987; Marsh 1992). Furthermore, surprisingly little effort has been made to incorporate sociological theory into research on extracurricular activities to help explain why participation may help students achieve. Consequently, two key questions remain unanswered: (1) how participating in sports promotes achievement or (2) whether the benefits of participation are unique to sports or it participating in nonsports activities also improves achievement. In this article, I address these two questions so that we may better understand the role of the extracurriculum in students' achievement.
EXTRACURRICULAR ACTIVITIES
High School Sports
School sports have been the focal point of research on extracurricular activities. Early analyses of the effect of participation in sports on academic achievement produced inconsistent evidence. Whereas some studies supported the "dumb jock" stereotype (Coleman 1961; Landers et al. 1978), others suggested that athletes outperform nonathletes in school (Rehberg 1969; Schafer and Armer 1968). Regardless of their findings, none of these studies analyzed nationally representative samples, and many failed to control for background differences (e.g., race, family income, and parents' educational attainment) between athletes and nonathletes. Furthermore, as cross-sectional designs, none of them was able to provide evidence that the relationship between sports and achievement is causal, not simply...