Extracurricular activities, such as playing sports, instruments, and joining after school clubs are highly encouraged by adults and teachers for growing adolecents. Recently, the principal of the Generic_School stated all students must participate in at least one extracurricular activity. I believe forcing students to join a club activity will be unnecessary, unproductive, and inefficient considering the cost and the effort. There is not enough data and evidence to ensure that all students will like their activities, it will create a fair cooperation and competition environment among diverse groups of students, and finally to prove that every student will enjoy extracurricular activities.

My first argument is that it will force students to participate in an activity that they might not enjoy which is unhealthy. My current school, Generic_School, does not have unlimited budget, faculty members, and space for different club activities. With very limited resources, the school will much prefer to establish more popular clubs than smaller clubs. Options that the school offer may not serve everyone's interest, but students will still need to choose an unappealing activity because it is mandotary. For example, when I was at a camp last summer, I was asked to choose five different activities. However, they did not offer all the courses I wanted and I ended up joining the swimming class which is my least favorite sport. From my own personal experience, I concern how some students might lose their interests or end up disliking their chosen clubs activities.

Secondly, the plan seems unfair for certain group of students and will develop an unhealthy competition environment. It will simply create a disparity betweeen students who can afford private lessons or tutorings to get better at the activity and those who cannot. For example, a clarinet player who receives private lessons and plays in a local band will be able to perform much harder music and eventually be placed in a more advanced band than his peers who cannot afford the cost. This allows an environment where certain group of students will continue to get better and others cannot. Not only will it pressure the students with unnecessary stress, but it will also burden their parents financially.

Lastly and most importantly, it does not necessary have to be an extracurricular activity as far as the students are passionate about the activity. For example, some people might be passionate about learning foreign languages and cultures or solving creative math problems which are not considered extracurricular activities. Extracurricular activities are meant to help students find their hobbies and interests. However, for students who already have hobbies that are not necessary defined as an extracurricular activity, such as reading books or writing creative stories, it is not right to force them to do something that they are not interested in when they have already found their interests. Everyone is born with different talent and interest. For instance, I enjoy public speaking and joined the Generic_School Debate team, whereas others might fear giving speechs in front of their classmates during civics class. Extracurricular activities may not be the best option for all students.

Although extracurricular activities are known to promote adolecents' overall well-being in general, there seems to be more disadvantages than benefits to this plan. Because the school board has limited resources to offer, it will be practically difficult to make extracurricular activities mandotary and ensure all students could benefit from this plan. We also cannot make sure that everyone will like the activities and create health and only necessary competition among the students. I value some benefits of this proposal but believe that it is more disadvantageous towards students and that is the reason why I disagree with this plan.