Derek Jeter Had to Be a 'Tremendous' Student: 'I Couldn't Play Sports Unless I Got Good Grades' (Exclusive)

"Education was big for me and my family," the famed athlete tells PEOPLE exclusively

Derek Jeter is reflecting on his high school days.

In an exclusive conversation with PEOPLE ahead of a ceremony to unveil new baseball and softball fields for young athletes at his alma mater, Kalamazoo Central High School in Michigan, the famed athlete, 49, opens up about what type of student he was years ago.

"I was a tremendous student," Jeter says with a smile. "No, I really was. I couldn't play sports unless I got good grades."

Highlighting that he had just under a 4.0 GPA in high school, he continues, "My parents were big on education."

"I was born in New Jersey, but I moved to Michigan because my dad was getting his PhD at Western Michigan. My mom was an accountant," the father of four adds. "Education was big for me and my family. I was a good [student]."

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All these years later, after becoming one of the world's most successful athletes, Jeter sums up getting to see his high school's baseball fields revamped for future generations to come with one word — "Awesome."

The new fields were made possible through Kalamazoo Public Schools, Elite Companies, Jeter's Turn 2 Foundation and Cal Ripken Jr.’s nonprofit, the Cal Ripken, Sr. Foundation, which provided renovated and reoriented fields, new seating, new dugouts and synthetic turf, according to a press release.

"Cal is someone I idolized growing up, being a taller shortstop," Jeter says. "The work that the Cal Ripken Sr. Foundation does throughout the entire country is pretty remarkable."

Adds Ripken Jr., 63, "It's always exciting for me to come in and open a new field. In our foundation, I think we've done 114 of them to this point, there's always an energy and a newness."

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Jeter now hopes that the updated fields will inspire athletes of all ages and backgrounds to be the best players they can be.

"You learn a lot of lessons when you play sports. I'm a little biased, but I think baseball's the greatest game in the world," the former New York Yankees shortstop says. "I think the one thing that baseball teaches you is to deal with failure. There aren't too many professions where you can fail 70% of the time and go to the Hall of Fame."

"There's a lot of lessons. There's setting goals. There's work ethic," Jeter adds. "These are lessons I learned on a baseball field. Not everyone's going to be a professional baseball player or want to be a professional baseball player, but you hope that they learn life lessons from playing sports."

As for Ripken Jr., a former shortstop and third baseman for the Baltimore Orioles, he says, "There's all kinds of lessons that sports teaches you."

"Once you go through the hard work it takes to be good in sports, you learn certain principles or values," he adds. "I think each person is different when they step on the field, but understanding your role on the field as a team, understanding how to work with others and do it in a teamwork sense, all those things just naturally happen."

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