Most student athletes in high school just play the sport team they’re on just because it’s fun and it’s the sport they’ve been playing for years, or they want something new so they think that they’ll try out a new sport. Student athletes go into the sport not thinking about scholarships to colleges, or even the future of this sport.

Roughly two years ago, senior Chris Thompson had been the star Quarterback for our high school’s football team but then stopped playing football to focus on his track career. He had to make the choice between football or a sport that he knew he could simply go farther in with scholarship money.

Thompson has been offered an amazing opportunity: to receive a scholarship for Track and Field at the University of Iowa in Iowa City, Iowa. In order to earn this amazing opportunity Thompson joined the Lemont High School track team and signed up for “Track my Speed”, got his times from his events and emailed coaches to find scholarships and between all of that, he worked his hardest to reach this goal.

He is very excited to have gotten this opportunity from UI because of the benefits other than running for a D1 university. He said that it would most definitely help with tuition costs, free tutoring, free meals, and just traveling the country is an exciting thought.

Iowa has been at the top of Thompson’s’ list along with Michigan State, Notre Dame and Illinois State, but even if he hadn’t received this scholarship, he would’ve gone to Iowa regardless. The reason being that he felt as though it was an overall benefit for both his athletic career and academic career toward his future major.

While he is excited to start his college career as a student athlete, some things that he’s most excited about would be that he knows that Iowa has a good track team and it would be cool if they won the Big Ten Outdoor Track and Field Championship.

In the end, Thompson is on the right track toward a promising future with this amazing opportunity by working hard and reaching his goals and the high school couldn’t be more promising.