High School football star’s urgent plea to NC Gov. Cooper to open schools, allow sports

A high school football player from Pilot Mountain is urging N.C. Governor Roy Cooper to open schools this fall and allow students to return to the classroom — and the field.

East Surry High’s Samuel Whitt wrote a long letter to Cooper that he posted on social media Wednesday night. According to his Hudl page, Whitt is a 6-foot, 270-pound sophomore offensive and defensive lineman with a 4.43 GPA. He helped East Surry to the 2019 N.C. 1AA state championship in December, the first in school history.

Whitt is a two-time all conference player at his school, located about a 95-minute drive northwest from Charlotte. Last season, he had 51 pancake blocks and helped East Surry run up more than 6,000 yards of offense

Whitt said students have been through a lot during the pandemic and are looking for the sense of normalcy that school and sports can provide.

“The past four months have been unlike anything we as children have ever seen,” Whitt wrote. “We saw friend’s parents lose jobs or our favorite diner have to shut down due to a lack of business. That is a lot for our already immature minds to process.”

One of the things Whitt said has helped himself and his friends cope was the thought of returning to class this fall. But he notes that returning to school — or at least school as he has known it — is now in doubt.

Cooper recently released a plan for reopening schools that could leave students attending on half days or even alternating days if North Carolina’s COVID-19 case numbers do not improve. Plans range from using minimal to moderate social distancing and also a plan that would only include remote learning.

In his letter, Whitt notes that some N.C. colleges like North Carolina and N.C. State have set academic calendars and the NCAA has released a schedule for a return to college football practice.

“I find it hard to believe,” Whitt writes, “how colleges with larger student bodies composed of students from all over North Carolina and the United States have concrete start dates, as well as the resumption of athletics, while K-12 schools appear to be headed in the opposite direction.”

Wednesday, Whitt argued in his letter that missing on-campus instruction is detrimental in many ways, including socially, and worries that missing a season will cost many students a chance at a college scholarship in fall sports like football.

“If sports and academics can’t gain a sense of normalcy again soon,” he writes, “I worry student’s aspirations for further education may become impossible, especially those in the upcoming senior class. As you probably know, distance learning is difficult for students and teachers who yearn to be in the classroom and challenge each other.”

Whitt ends his letter by saying he worries that unless schools open in the fall “with little or no restrictions, sports as we know them will not be a reality.”

“I feel,” he wrote, “this would be detrimental to students, athletes, teachers and coaches all over North Carolina ... I understand that you are trying to keep the citizens of NC safe from this terrible pandemic, but I implore you to please think of the health of the whole child. We have to look at how an extension of this time without school and sports could drastically affect the students and future leaders of our state in a negative way.”