By Julianna W. Miner, Washington Post

According to a poll from the National Alliance for Youth Sports, about 70 percent of kids in the United States stop playing organized sports by the age of 13 because “it’s just not fun anymore.”

I have three kids, all of whom play sports, and my oldest is about to turn 13. I may not have understood why this was happening a few years ago, but sadly, knowing what I know now, the mass exodus of 13-year-olds from organized sports makes perfect sense to me.

“It’s not fun anymore” isn’t the problem; it’s a consequence of a number of cultural, economic and systemic issues that result in our kids turning away from organized sports at a time when they could benefit from them the most. Playing sports offers everything from physical activity, experiencing success and bouncing back from failure to taking calculated risks and dealing with the consequences to working as a team and getting away from the ubiquitous presence of screens.

Our middle-schoolers need sports now more than ever.

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