Not child's play

Tom Farrey, a regular correspondent with ESPN's primetime newsmagazine E:60, is coming to Wheaton College on Wednesday, September 24 to speak about youth sports in the United States. His talk will be at 7 p.m. in the Holman Room in Mary Lyon Hall.

His book, Game On: The All-American Race to Make Champions of Our Children, explores the pressure on younger and younger children to excel in organized athletic competition. The New York Times described the book as "a powerful, disturbing, yet exhilarating investigation into how we simultaneously empower and exploit our young."

Farrey joined ESPN in 1996 after eight years with The Seattle Times. According to his Web site, the veteran journalist's work has been recognized among the nation's best on television, in print and online. In 2007, he was one of seven journalists selected among the "100 Most Influential Sports Educators in America" by a panel of experts brought together by the Institute for International Sport at the University of Rhode Island.

Farrey also has contributed reporting for Outside the Lines and SportsCenter, ESPN.com, and in ESPN The Magazine, where he is a senior writer. His work has won two Emmy awards for Outstanding Sports Journalism as well as top national honors from, among other organizations, the Sigma Delta Chi/Society of Professional Journalists, the Asian American Journalists Association, the U.S. Basketball Writers Association and the Women's Sports Foundation.

A synopsis of the book on Farrey's Web site offers a glimpse into the subject: "Youth sport is the most important institution in all of sports, because it's where everything begins. It's where we first fall in love with a game, picking up fitness habits and rooting interests that can last a lifetime. It's where many of us learn early lessons about teamwork, integrity and competition. It's where the next generation of leaders often emerges—helping shape the future of a republic that for more than 100 years has looked to organize the play of children for the sake of nation-building.

But youth sport isn't just orange slices and all-star trophies anymore. It's 14-year-olds who enter high school with a decade of football experience, 9-year-olds chasing college scholarships, 5-year-olds competing for world golf championships, and 3-year-olds in uniforms and organized games. It's a year-round "travel team" in every community … and parents who fear that not making the cut in grade school will cost their kid the chance to play in high school. In short, a landscape in which performance often matters more than participation, all the way down to biddy basketball."