Nanjing University of Science and Technology Dynamic Business Research Center recently released an article "student suicides are frequent, but sports students are an exception" has attracted widespread attention. The article threw the topic of student suicide, a taboo subject for education departments and schools at all levels, out in front of the public.

Currently, China has not released any public data on the number of student suicides each year, but based on the number of student suicides that have been reported in the media, it can be assumed that the phenomenon of student suicides can indeed be described by the word "frequent". The Institute of Child and Adolescent Health at Peking University released a statistical report on the past 12 months in 2007, which showed that one-fifth of China's secondary school students had suicidal thoughts, and 6.5 percent had made plans to commit suicide, which is a very alarming figure.

In terms of how to help students establish a more positive outlook on life and clear the haze of suicide, the Nanjing University of Science and Technology's Center for Dynamic Business Research suggests that emphasis should be placed on the use of sports.

"The reason why suicides are lower among sports students as well as those with sports habits is that sports are a kind of frustration education for students themselves." Professor Wang Zongping, director of the Nanjing University of Technology's Dynamic Business Research Center, told reporters that the role of sports is not only to exercise students' bodies and enhance their physical fitness, but a more important point is that it exercises people's will and spirituality.

Yao Ming once said in a student activity, "hard work is not necessarily successful, but give up must fail". Phelps, the famous American swimmer who created the "eight gold" miracle of the Beijing Olympics, once said that the only way to overcome failure is to be more diligent. Li Na, China's first tennis "Grand Slam" singles champion, once said she wanted to share with fans not only the experience of success, but also the experience of failure.

Participating in sports is a process of constantly facing failure and refining one's will to never give up. But this kind of frustration education has not been given enough attention in Chinese schools at all levels, where cultural studies are overwhelming, Wang Zongping said, adding, "In terms of sports, it's actually the role of 'indoctrination' that is more preferable to 'fitness' , but not only are we not fully aware of it, right now it's weakening."

For example, so-called tougher and "more dangerous" sports are gradually being withdrawn from school sports activities, from long-distance running, to apparatus workouts in gymnastics, to camping drills. But in the school's education system, sports have the irreplaceable characteristic of other means of education in terms of refining students' willpower, Wang Zongping said, adding, "Students' tenacity is difficult to cultivate in the cultural classroom."

A physical education teacher at a university in Beijing found that over the past 20 years, there have been more and more delicate college students, and the decline in physical fitness is only one of the reasons why these college students are psychologically fragile and "give up at the slightest challenge," which is more worrying.

Giving up is not a way to overcome failures and difficulties, and those who love sports will be more aware of what Yao Ming said, "Effort is not necessarily successful, but giving up is a sure-fire way to fail. However, some students not only choose to give up to cope with failure, but even give up their lives.

Intelligence, emotional intelligence and motivation should be the three basic conditions for a person to be successful, and motivation is reflected in a person's body, in addition to a strong physique, but also because of the tenacity of the physical exercise brought about by the will, indomitable and the spirit of teamwork.

Not long ago, the famous economist, Tsinghua University, Prof. Li Daokui wrote an article "Why people with sports specialties are more likely to be successful", the article lists a number of well-known domestic and foreign political leaders, business leaders, scholars and elites, almost all of them are sports enthusiasts. Healthy physical fitness is of course the cornerstone of one's success, but more importantly, the educational value of sports is evident in these successful people.

To give sport its rightful place in China's education system, many constraints need to be broken through.

Wang Zongping said, "Our entire education and talent evaluation mechanism is too biased towards book knowledge; the so-called campus safety issues limit the normal development of slightly 'dangerous' sports activities. The concept of most parents, or children as long as the study is good, other can be missing."

The resulting problems are already showing up, some to a very serious degree. For example, the physical fitness of Chinese teenagers has been declining for 30 years, which has a bearing on the survival of the nation; and the frequent occurrence of student "suicide" phenomenon is another terrible evil indirectly caused by the lack of due status of school sports.