Every morning here at PHS we have announcements, “support your team”, “wish them luck” ‘these talented kids that run around’. Do we ever hear about people in the arts/non-athletics doing ANYTHING? Such as Band, Choir, Theatre/Drama, Skills USA, Robotics, Art Guild, Speech and Debate. No. We don’t.

Throughout history people have been unappreciative of the arts. Let’s take football for example. It has been around for 148 years. Whereas music and plays have been around since 500 B.C. and the early fifth century.

Anyone can act. Yeah, you act like a MO-ROHN every day; congrats you’re the lead role. There are people who are braver than Frodo and Sam for being able to stand up in front of others and pretend to be someone or even something they aren’t. For example my classmate, senior Braden Schiller, does a fantastic job as a wall for the next play.

Anyone can play an instrument and walk at the same time. Have you tried to walk on beat, pay attention to who or what is around you only using your peripherals, while keeping track of where you are in the song and not messing up the notes and getting the sound just right? You don’t want to be THAT kid. Chill, it’s not a solo.

Anyone can sing in front of people. No, some people are born with a vocal impediment and are known to have possibly caused the deafness of others. One of the vocally challenged people is I. Yeah, there are some people who think they can sing. Key word THINK, then there are actual people who are blessed by the gods and had their vocal cords kissed by angels.

Sports are more important. It takes all my willpower to not smack someone when they say this, but it’s clear this is the attitude in our school. Take a look at the budget. The non-athletic departments receive hardly any funding or when we do receive a pittance for maybe one trip a year. That’s mainly because the big total budget given to the principal is shrinking year by year. PHS Administrators, Mr. James  Kuhn and Mr. Tim Wormald said the budget for activities which are the non-athletics is $30,000 and the budget for athletic people is $55,000. SkillsUSA members are required to log hours and hours and make over $200 per person to even be able to go to only two events.

At Powell High School Wrestling has the highest budget overall, because of all the traveling they do and overnighters. Speech and debate has the second highest budget for their overnights and traveling. Track and Field has the highest budget for supplies, second and third highest is Football and Drama. However I will restate that this overall budget is gradually shrinking, within the next few years none of our activities might not be able to travel or compete out of state at all.

I’m not trying to say sports are unimportant. That is the total opposite. I am saying that there are so many groups that do not receive equal priority. All I would ask for is equal importance for all.