Win for American Girls<\/strong><\/p>\n

By Maureen Rossi<\/a><\/p>\n

According to Fox News, The United States\u2019 5-2 victory<\/a> over Japan in the Women\u2019s World Cup final almost two weeks back was seen by 25.4 million viewers.\u00a0 Fox should know, they aired it.\u00a0 They say it\u2019s a record for any soccer game, men\u2019s or women\u2019s, shown on English-language television in this country. The U.S. team took the cup when they beat Japan July 5^{th<\/sup> in a 5-2 win.<\/p>\n}

Fox reports another 1.3 million viewers watched the historic win on Telemundo, the Spanish-language station.\u00a0 So the total of 26.7 million also exceeds the record 26.5 million viewers who watched last year\u2019s Men\u2019s World Cup.<\/p>\n

Still riding the high of the win and an incredible ticker tape parade down the Canyon of Heroes in downtown Manhattan, they can also celebrate their popularity on the boob tube.<\/p>\n

Americans may be the last country to get on the bus but as a nation we are rapidly joining other countries as far as our interest in the game of \u201cfootball\u201d or soccer as it\u2019s called here.<\/p>\n

Was this a fluke, not the win but the amount of people who watched it?\u00a0\u00a0 Ed Desser is a sports television consultant and former N.B.A. executive.\u00a0 He says it was somewhat of a perfect storm.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 It was of course a time of year with light sports competition.\u00a0 The American team was a strong team and easy to root for as they were 2011 Women\u2019s World Cup finalists.\u00a0 In addition there was enormous amount of buildup for the American team on both Fox and Fox Sports 1.\u00a0 It might have been a trifecta.<\/p>\n

But the interest in women\u2019s sports is a great thing.\u00a0 Woman\u2019s Sports have come a very long way in the last decades, in even just the last five years.\u00a0\u00a0 The Women\u2019s Sports Foundation is a Long Island based non-profit founded in 1974 by tennis legend, Billie Jean King.\u00a0 Their goal is to advance the lives of girls and women through sports and physical activity.\u00a0 Needless to say they were undoubtedly thrilled with the big U.S. win for the women\u2019s team.<\/p>\n

Deborah Slaner Larkin is the CEO of the Women\u2019s Sports Foundation.\u00a0\u00a0 \u201cToday we provide scholarships and grants to aspiring athletes,\u201d she explained.\u00a0 In addition they fund groundbreaking research and public awareness campaigns. \u201cWe educate. We advocate, she added.\u00a0 The programs they organize are in cities across the nation. \u201cWe still have a long way to go, but it\u2019s gratifying to see our hard work make a difference,\u201d said Larkin.<\/p>\n

The Long Island non-profit has accomplished a great deal in four decades.\u00a0 \u201cThrough 40 years of research experience, the WSF has created and supported programs to provide the health, education, social skills and leadership benefits that girls need to succeed in life. Our research is the foundation for everything we do and helps identify needs that WSF programs can fulfill,\u201d said Larkin.<\/p>\n

The Foundation has a $4 million operating budget and offices in Nassau County, N.Y., and New York City.<\/p>\n

Women and Sports\u00a0<\/strong>The Statistics<\/strong><\/p>\n

Maureen Rossi<\/p>\n

If you have a daughter, little sister, niece or grand-daughter, get outside and toss a ball, kick a ball, go for a run or ride a bike.\u00a0 You won\u2019t regret it and according to the Women\u2019s Sports Foundation \u2013 it will have a positive affect!<\/p>\n

BENEFITS OF PARTICIPATION<\/p>\n

Female high school athletes are 41% more likely to graduate from college within six years compared to female high school students who did not participate in sports. (Youth and\u00a0<\/em>Society Journa<\/em>l as cited in \u201cStudy Cites Athletics\u2019 Academic Impact.\u201d The NCAA News, January 28, 2008.)<\/p>\n

A study by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention discovered that girls who received the highest levels of physical education, or 70 to 300 minutes a week, scored consistently higher on the tests than those who spent less than 35 minutes a week. The findings come at a time where only 12.6% of students meet the Healthy People 2010 objective of daily participation in phys-ed and receive physical education only one or two times a week. (Carlson, Susan. (2008). \u201cPhysical Education and Academic Achievement in Elementary School: Data From the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study.\u201d American Journal\u00a0<\/em>of Public Health<\/em> as cited in USA Today<\/em>, March, 2008.)<\/p>\n

In an examination of 2008 NCAA Division I Sweet 16 basketball programs, four women\u2019s programs had a graduation success rate (GSR) of 100%, compared to only one men\u2019s program.\u00a0 Additionally, no women\u2019s teams had lower than 55% GSR, while eight men\u2019s teams had a GSR of less than 55%. Overall, female student-athletes did better academically than male student-athletes. However, there is a large gap between Caucasian and African-American student-athletes for both men\u2019s and women\u2019s teams, with Caucasian students graduating at higher rates than African American students. (Lapchick & Little, E., (2008.)<\/p>\n

Female Division I student-athletes entering college during the 2001-2002 academic year had higher graduation success rates than their non-athlete peers and male student-athletes.\u00a0 Female student-athlete graduation rates were seven percentage points higher than that of non-athlete female students (72%, compared to 65%). Additionally, male students graduated at 59%, while male student-athletes graduated at a rate of 57%. (\u201cBig Gains for Blacks and Women.\u201d NCAA News<\/em>, Fall 2008.)<\/p>\n

More than 80% of women\u2019s collegiate basketball teams graduated 70% of their student-athletes. (Lapchick, Richard. (2008). \u201cGraduation Rates Show Promise, Room for Improvement.\u201d Street & Smith\u2019s Sports Business Journal.)<\/em><\/p>\n

According to an Oxygen\/Markle Pulse poll, 56% of women agree with the statement that seeing successful female athletes makes them feel proud to be a woman.\u00a0 (Marketing to\u00a0<\/em>Women<\/em>, March 2001.)<\/p>\n

According to a study of 2,993 women, older women who exercise tend to be motivated toward physical activity by expectations of benefit to their health and longevity.\u00a0 Inactive women tend not to have the self-confidence, skill and experience with physical activity that active women do.\u00a0 (\u201cMotivation for exercise studied.\u201d Melpomene Journal<\/em>, Fall 1997.)<\/p>\n

Researchers from Penn State say exercise may be more important than calcium consumption for young women to ensure proper bone health as they get older. They studied 81 young women, aged 12 to 16, beginning in 1990. When the girls reached 18, the researchers found no relationship between calcium consumption and bone mineral density. However, there was a strong link between physical activity and bone mineral density (BMD). The researchers found that consistent activity, rather than fitness or exercise intensity, was the best predictor of healthy levels of BMD. (Pediatrics Fitness\u00a0<\/em>Bulletin<\/em>, Aug. 2000.)<\/p>\n

Women who exercise vigorously while trying to quit smoking are twice as likely to kick the habit than wannabe ex-smokers who don't work out regularly.\u00a0 Researchers also found that women who worked out as they tried to quit gained only about half the weight of those who did not exercise.\u00a0 (Archives of Internal Medicine<\/em> as cited in \u201cExercise helps women quit smoking.\u201d New York Times<\/em>, June 14, 1999.)<\/p>\n

Families with children who participate in sports report higher levels of family satisfaction. (Sabo, D. & Veliz, P., (2008.) Go Out and Play: Youth Sports in America\u00a0<\/em>Women\u2019s Sports Foundation.)<\/p>\n

\u0095Girls who participate in athletics report being more content with their lives than girls who do not participate in athletics. Much of the social, educational, and health benefits of sports participation become visible in elementary school years for girls and boys. (Sabo, D. & Veliz, P., (2008.) Go Out and Play: Youth Sports in America.\u00a0<\/em>Women\u2019s Sports Foundation.)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Win for American Girls By Maureen Rossi According to Fox News, The United States\u2019 5-2 victory over Japan in the Women\u2019s World Cup final almost two weeks back was seen by 25.4 million viewers.\u00a0 Fox should know, they aired it.\u00a0 They say it\u2019s a record for any soccer game, men\u2019s or women\u2019s, shown on English-language television in this country. The U.S. team took the cup when they beat Japan July 5th in a 5-2 win. Fox reports another 1.3 million viewers watched the historic win on Telemundo, the Spanish-language station.\u00a0 So the total of 26.7 million also exceeds the record […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2712,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_bbp_topic_count":0,"_bbp_reply_count":0,"_bbp_total_topic_count":0,"_bbp_total_reply_count":0,"_bbp_voice_count":0,"_bbp_anonymous_reply_count":0,"_bbp_topic_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_reply_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_forum_subforum_count":0,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[341],"tags":[],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-2711","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-in-the-know"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/smithtowntodaynews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/07\/soccer.jpg?fit=1024%2C689&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6dZB9-HJ","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/smithtowntodaynews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2711","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/smithtowntodaynews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/smithtowntodaynews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/smithtowntodaynews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/smithtowntodaynews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2711"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/smithtowntodaynews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2711\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2713,"href":"https:\/\/smithtowntodaynews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2711\/revisions\/2713"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/smithtowntodaynews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2712"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/smithtowntodaynews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2711"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/smithtowntodaynews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2711"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/smithtowntodaynews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2711"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/smithtowntodaynews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=2711"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}