In this blog post, I’ll summarize what I learned and how I prepared to major in physical education, based on my soccer activities and academic experiences during high school.
Academic Experiences and Reflections
During high school, my involvement in the soccer team naturally led me to choose a career path in physical education. Since I was athletically gifted and enjoyed physical training, I devoted most of my life to sports—playing soccer during morning practice after school and during every break. However, focusing so intensely on sports led me to neglect my studies, and I felt stressed by the prejudice among those around me that students involved in sports couldn’t do well academically. Determined to prove that I wouldn’t neglect my studies even while majoring in physical education, I began to pay closer attention to my academics.
In particular, I focused on improving my English to maintain my grades. This was because I recognized that as the field of sports becomes increasingly globalized, exchanges with other countries are on the rise, and there will be more opportunities to communicate with foreign athletes. Therefore, I set a goal from a young age to become a global athlete by mastering English, and in high school, I actively took advantage of classes taught by native English speakers to intensively practice listening and speaking.
Since the native English teacher’s classes were conducted entirely in English from start to finish, some parts felt unfamiliar and difficult to understand at first. However, as I listened repeatedly, I gradually became accustomed to it. Rather than just passively listening, I would immediately raise my hand and ask questions whenever an unfamiliar word came up. After hearing the teacher’s explanation, I would always take notes and later look up the words in an English-English dictionary to reinforce my learning. Since I primarily used an English-English dictionary rather than English-Korean or Korean-English dictionaries, the process of understanding word meanings in English often led me to encounter additional unfamiliar expressions, enabling a chain of learning as I looked those up as well. This significantly improved my vocabulary and comprehension. During class, I made an effort to communicate actively with the teacher, and that process itself was a major help in developing my English skills.
Major School Activities and Reflections
The most meaningful activity I participated in during high school was founding and managing the girls’ soccer team. The school fostered an atmosphere that encouraged physical education, and while there were various clubs such as basketball, volleyball, and tennis, there were relatively few girls’ teams. Since I had been playing soccer since middle school, I naturally wanted to continue playing in high school, and I decided to form a team myself to address the lack of a girls’ soccer team at our school.
The process of forming the team and requesting the school to elect a manager and assign a coach and trainer was not easy. While the school was supportive of the idea of a girls’ soccer team, they said it would be difficult to assign a coach immediately; the principal advised that if we managed the team well and achieved results, support could be expanded. I decided to take the initiative myself to secure the necessary budget and coaching support.
The biggest challenge was recruiting members. Since this was a brand-new girls’ soccer team, we needed to promote it actively to attract players. As the team captain, I wrote a statement outlining my vision and used it to promote the team. Taking advantage of our school’s strong sports culture, we attracted more students than expected. From among them, I selected players based on their skills, and the rest took on roles as managers or support staff.
The team members prioritized the team’s growth over their personal ambitions and carried out their roles voluntarily. For example, a student who had originally hoped to be a goalkeeper recognized the skill gap between herself and another teammate and took on the role of manager to support the team, fulfilling her duties diligently and without complaint. The administrative team leveraged their connections with other schools to arrange external matches, and the players began to achieve results through teamwork on the field. As these results accumulated, the school administration gradually began providing budgetary and coaching support.
Writing About Examples of Consideration, Sharing, and Cooperation, and My Reflections
After founding the girls’ soccer team, I led the team as captain for about two years. While I enjoyed soccer itself and derived great satisfaction from playing, the position of captain came with both responsibility and pressure. As we consistently built up our achievements, I entered my senior year of high school and needed to focus on physical education and college entrance exams, so I decided to pass the captaincy on to a junior. I believed that knowing when to step down is an important quality of a leader.
Even after handing over the captaincy to a junior, I continued my role as manager at her request to lead the support team. During the day, I devoted myself to school classes and college entrance exam preparation, while in the evenings, I fulfilled my duties as manager—such as arranging away games and coordinating practice schedules—effectively managing my time. My juniors followed my guidance well and trained even harder, for which I was grateful.
As a manager, I was able to offer advice on strategies and preparation methods based on my own competitive experience. For example, when I analyzed the opposing team’s strengths and weaknesses to suggest tactics or pointed out key considerations for game management, I felt a great sense of fulfillment watching my juniors successfully apply these insights in actual matches and lead the team to victory. While managing the team, I realized the joy and fulfillment of not only being an athlete but also serving as a coach and manager.
Efforts and Preparation Related to Motivation for Application and Career Plans
My motivation for applying to the Department of Physical Education stemmed from my goal to be a “lifelong sports professional.” While founding a women’s soccer team and serving as both a player and manager, I dedicated myself to athletic training morning and night, and these experiences helped solidify my professional goals. My experiences in high school gave me the confidence that what started as a simple hobby could lead to a lifelong career.
As a high school student, I made an effort to balance my extensive participation in sports with my academic studies. In particular, by focusing on my English studies and maintaining good grades in my core subjects, I was able to prepare for the sports admissions process relatively smoothly during my senior year. While I know I will need to train and study even more diligently once I enter college, I am prepared to grow academically while gaining experience in various sports.
In college, I plan to learn not only soccer but also various other sports such as basketball, volleyball, tennis, and handball, while studying coaching theory, motor development, training methodology, and exercise prescription in depth. In particular, through my experience as a team manager, I confirmed my aptitude and interest in working as a trainer or coach, and based on this, my primary goal is to develop expertise as a personal trainer.
In the long term, my ultimate dream is to successfully complete a physical education instructor internship during my senior year of college and become a professional who contributes to the local community and social welfare as a lifelong physical education instructor. By combining practical coaching experience with theoretical knowledge gained in college, I will grow into a physical education professional dedicated to improving people’s quality of life.
