"Have Sports Brought Down America's High Schools?" Response

The author's thesis for this article is very clear. She claims that the education of high school students aren't sufficient, and high school sports are to blame. The writer uses narration at the beginning of the article by talking about a student who was attended high school in Poland. She compares her own kids' lives with the kids in Poland. She goes into cause and effect, saying that if we improve on our education in math, science, and literature, our test scores will improve. The article is persuasive and convincing. The way she compares America to other countries make the reader feel as though the United States isn't the best, that improvements can be made. This is what the writer wanted to accomplish, and she succeeded.