Sportspeople (especially those involved in competitive sports) constitute a special group of students, and their efficiency is an important, but still a not very well researched, issue. Athletes are supposed to perform well in two roles simultaneously: in their studies and in their sports career. It generates a number of difficulties. Competitive sports require a great deal of time and energy because of the daily training sessions and the events the sportspeople participate in (Lenténé Puskás & Perényi, 2015). Athletes are under continuous pressure and face continuous expectations at both the sports fields and at the classrooms. As they are able to spend less time in the academic sphere, they might easily get separated from their peers and from the teaching staff, and it might generate a sense of loneliness, a sense of solitude in them and risk of drop our either from education or from sports.

The aim of our presentation is to explore the effect of sporting habits and integration on different dimensions of academic achievement (learning self-assessment, foreign study plans and extra-study work). Our main question is what is the interrelation between regular sport activity and especially sporting integration (using university sports infrastructure and attending sports events organized by institutions) and academic achievement.

Research results on the correlation of sports and student achievement are not consistent (especially in the case of upper-secondary school and higher education students): some found positive (Hartman, 2008; Field et al., 2001; Castelli et al., 2007), others found negative (Purdy et al., 1982; Maloney & McCormick, 1993) influence of sports, while a third set of research results have not identified any correlation of the two. The interrelations between persistence and sports are primarily examined by researchers from the side of sports; that is, what factors play a role in persistence in sports at the various levels of education, what may lead to drop out, and how are top level sportspeople in higher education able to lead a ”dual career”. The role of sports in persistence in studies, has, however, been given much less attention. It particularly applies to (Central) Europe, so our research is a novelty in that respect.

According to the personality development theory, sports develop personality by teaching to respect hard work, perseverance, improving a number of skills, self-confidence, maturity, social competences, increasing school participation, students’ educational and other performance, thus contributing to students’ school achievement (Broh, 2002; Miller et al., 2007). According to Coleman, extracurricular activities, such as sports, contribute to the acceptance of sporting youths, the establishment of their roles and authority among their peers and as a result of the popularity of sports, they build stronger relations with their teachers and parents. Consequently, their social capital increases, which impacts their educational achievement positively. This culminates in a so-called zero-sum situation as sporting consumes energy from learning, what is more, schools emphasize their athletes’ achievements and partly consider those as their success, thus by highlighting sports and sport achievements they also contribute to the worsening of academic achievement (Eitle & Eitle, 2002; Miller et al., 2007). As a result, they lose the benefit of social prestige, recognition and capital or the scale might move to the negative dimension and athletes perform worse at schools. Further causes for the negative or neutral impact of sports are constituted by the influential power of social background variables on achievement factors.

The research project titled PERSIST 2019 was conducted in the Northern Plains region of Hungary and four neighbouring regions outside Hungary (the Highlands, that is Slovakia, the subcarpathian region in the Ukraine, the Voivodina in Serbia and Partium/Transylvania in Romania) in 2018–2019 (N=2017). In the neighbouring countries, primarily the students of ethnic Hungarian institutions of higher education were involved in the project. target group consisted of second-year BA/BSc or second- and third-year students participating in teacher training programmes. The sample taken in Hungary is representative for the faculties, the subject matter of the courses and the forms of financing. At the institutions across the borders we made efforts to make probability sampling. In our research, we surveyed students’ sporting habits with several questions. The most important of these was the frequency of exercise, using university sports infrastructure and attending sport events organized by their HE institution (answer options: never; 1-2 times a year; 1-2 times a month; several times a month; 1-2 times a week; three or more times a week, recoded into 0-100 points, where 0 means never, 100 three times or more, and three categories of doing sport: almost never, occasionally, and regularly). We examined the level and organisational form of sports with the question of whether he is a member of a sports association or club, and also indicates the highest level among them, if so, and he receives payment for it. We asked what kind of sport they play most often, we created sports types from the answers, and we examined team and individual sports per-formers separately. Academic achievement was measured also in different forms, we examined the learning self-assessment, foreign study plans and extra-study work.

According to results we were unable to reveal any significant interrelation between any of the variable of individual sports habits and participation in foreign study trips. As for the plans of the students are concerned, it was clear that students who are involved in some sort of sport, either by using the sports facilities of the institution, or doing physical exercise, are more open to foreign studies. The average of learning self-assessment was the highest among students who attends the most frequently on university/college sport programs. Our analysis suggests that students who regularly do sports, and use the sports facilities of their respective institutions as the indicator of sporting integration, are willing to do more academic and professional work, sit for a language exam, and participate in the work of study groups. These activities are often rewarded with scholarships. All this shows that these students are more consciously prepare to reach their goals, since such activities will lead to higher academic work, doctoral programmes. These students are persistent, they make all the efforts and are not afraid of extra work. The members of sports clubs achieve outstanding results, especially those who are not subsidized for their membership, and it verifies Coleman’s (1961) theories on social capital and the positive effects of membership in extracurricular groups and associations (Pusztai 2015) on learning efficiency. This research project did not verify the zero-sum theory (Eitle & Eitle 2002; Miller et al., 2007; Coleman 1961) regarding subsidized competitive athletes. They are not characterized by lower academic performance, strong binds to their fellow athletes and isolation from the rest of the student community. Competitive sport has a positive effect on their extra study work as well, independently of their social-demographic background.

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