"Combining sports and grades" - UT important issue essay

I started it and i believe it sounds ok, but i need to know how to expand it more to 250 words. I have 200 exactly right now.

One of the many issues I believe is facing a majority of youth today is the issue of not being able to focus on both their sports and grades. This issue is not just concerned with the students themselves, but the coaches that are responsible for keeping them in line. I really became aware of this issue in my junior year in high school , when we had twenty upcoming freshman fail, and they were unable to play football. I found this extremely unsettling , just for the fact I play football and can manage a 3.7 GPA. Really looking at this issue led me to think why are there not any mandatory study groups for the "student - athlete". I say student athlete like this because I feel that school sports teams have forgotten about the student part, and only have the one goal of the athlete. The coaches at these schools are teachers themselves and should be worried about how these kids are doing. These twenty freshman that failed had a responsibility to grades themselves, and yes it is there fault they failed, but with a little more guidance I think they could of excelled a little more.

"This issue is not just of concern to the students themselves, but to the coaches that are responsible for keeping them in line."

"I think they could have excelled a little more."


You might want to elaborate on how you managed this, if you need more words.


Or, you could talk more about how you think the school should help student-athletes. A study group would be one step, but that's a bit vague, so adding some specificity might be a good idea.

As Sean said, it's "could have" not "could of."

Where does this common error come from?

could have = could've

"could've" sounds like "could of"

But, again, it is "could have -- "could of" makes no sense and marks the writer as poorly skilled.