Juvenile delinquency is on the rise in the black community. Delinquency commonly occurs to teenagers that live in dangerous environments and have too much leisure time. Consequences of juvenile delinquency can range from bad reputations to even legal trouble. I can remember the time I almost crossed that path. During the time I lived in the projects in Nashville, Tennessee. Luckily for me God had other plans in store for me. I was well on my way until my parents signed me up to play football. Playing football kept me out of the dangers of the streets, got me into school, and taught me responsibility.
If it was not for football who knows where I might have ended up. Most of the young adults from my neighborhood were either murdered or had frequent visits to jail. Even my closest friends, whom people would have assumed were good role models, became victims of the street lifestyle. If not for football I would have probably ended up on the same path. My parents noticed I had begun hanging with the wrong crowd, and their negative influence began to appear in my actions. I started getting into trouble at school, in the streets, and at social events. I reached the last straw with my parents when I began skipping school and I actually got arrested. After that my parents found the number to the closest Pop Warner team and registered me as soon as possible. The main reason football was able to help me make such a drastic change in my life was because it took away the leisure time I usually used to make bad decisions.
Football played a huge role in my education. Had it not been for football I would have never made it through high school, or made it to college. At the beginning of my high school career I had no hopes of making it to college. When I began taking football seriously it motivated me to try and get good grades so I could be eligible to play collegiate football. After some serious hard work by junior year in high school I had a GPA high enough to be able to receive scholarships.