College athletics

[Maister]

Does anyone else remember taking that course with that basketball or football star athlete? Chances are, you seldom saw them in class and they usually had some sort of 'helper' who showed up to class every day, took notes for them, probably tutored (or possibly cheated for them) and made sure the athlete passed their mid-terms and finals.

I don't mean to suggest this goes on with every college athlete, or even most. I had plenty of classes with students on various teams: track, tennis, gymnastics, soccer, among others, and found they were typically good/decent students. The ones that stuck in my craw, though, were the questionably literate ones on the full ride basketball or football scholarships that the university bent over backwards to accommodate and 'get them through'.

I don't know, maybe I'm looking at this all wrong and should accept that certain individuals with one particular talent are probably more valuable to a universtiy than a whole department of geology, astronomy or sociology geniuses. Or maybe not - what do you think?

 

[kjel]

At my undergraduate institution there was no football team but the basketball and soccer teams were well regarded. I recall most of them coming to the bulk of classes-they had to schedule their courses around their practice and game schedules. I don't think very many got a free pass as you described here. I am sure that it is probably much different in the Division I schools though.

While in high school I used to tutor a few young Canadian hockey players that were playing for the Portland Winterhawks which is a major junior ice hockey team. Many of them would come down from Canada and stay with a host family and attend school between road trips.

 

[ofos]

Many moons ago, I took an introductory astronomy course at the University of Michigan from the renowned Dr. Hazel Losh. While she was an excellent academic, much of her fame outside astronomy came from the Losh ABC grading scale; A for Athletes, B for Boys, and C for Coeds. Many of my classmates were on the football team and while they undoubtedly got good grades, she made them work for them. I'm proud to say that I also got an A, even though my school team athletics ended with high school.

Footnote: Several years later, when I was a grad assistant at EMU, the name of a basketball player appeared on the class list for my introductory earth science lab. He never made it to class, never dropped the class, got a failing grade from me, but it apparently didn't effect his eligibility or his future. The students name? George Gervin, aka The Iceman, of NBA fame. I met him several years ago and gave him a hard time about it. We both laughed about his time in academia.

 

[stroskey]

I'll go record again saying if you can't get into college on academic marks you shouldn't get in just for sports. Get in and then build your team. Period.

 

[Maister]

I am sure that it is probably much different in the Division I schools though.

Good point. To clarify, the scenario I described occurred at a Division I school. I wonder if the same thing happens, though, at smaller schools that have built themselves around a single sport (e.g. Gonzaga + basketball)?

 

[Brocktoon]

I attended a large Division I PAC 10 program that is far from the Harvard of the West. I had classes with several of the Olypmic sport atheletes and they were always in class and for the most part did quite well as far as I knew.

I never had class with any football or basketball players but I fraternity brothers that did and it was a mixed bag. Some attended class and particpated and others did not. My roomate had a class with a current NFL TE and he said he rarely missed a class and always was prepared. He was not the smartest guy but you could tell that he studied.

 

[biscuit]

I wonder how many classes were missed for all of those extra practices at Michigan this past couple of seasons?

I love NCAA football. So much that even follow the usual snoozefest that is Big East. That's how much I like it. But having attended a school without a football program I too think that academics have to come first. The NFL using colleges as their minor league is kind of bothersome to me.

 

[JNA]

Topic related press release from the NCCA that you did not see in the sports section:
NCAA Honors Teams with Highest Marks in Class
http://www.ncaa.org/wps/portal/ncaa...ic+reform/20100512+apr+public+recognition+rls

The APR provides a real-time view of a team’s academic success by tracking the progress of each student-athlete during the school year. By measuring eligibility and retention each semester or quarter, the APR provides a clear picture of the academic culture in each sport.

 

[Otis]

I also attended a Division 1 Pac-10. My senior year I took a class and when I walked in the first day I noticed most of the students in the class were football and basketball players. "Cool," I thought. This will be easy. It wasn't all that easy, but it wasn't very hard either. Most of the athletes showed up most days, and everyone had substantial work to do. BUT a week before the final exam somehow they all ended up with an advance copy of it.

 

[Zoning Goddess]

My sr year at Univ of FL I got "special permission" from the head of the English Dept to take a graduate level course. First day, big class. After the prof went over the syllabus, half the class left. He said "Football players', looking for an easy class". It was a graduate-level class in children's lit. I thought, I had to argue up and down with the dept head to get in that class but football players just sign up and get in? Yep.

 

[TexanOkie]

I was in the OU band, so I got to meet Bob Stoops on several occasions.

Also, my later years in school I worked for OU Housing at one of the campus apartment complexes. Former OU and current Minnesota Vikings running back Adrian Peterson lived at this complex for one of those years, as did former OU basketball forward Longar Longar. Peterson would frequent the office/clubhouse regularly, as he was prone to lose his apartment key and occasionally enjoyed a round of pool with some of his friends. I was surprised at how normal of a guy he was. Didn't see much of Longar, but I recall he had to duck to enter the office when he moved out.

My wife was a sociology-criminology major, which was apparently a popular major for football players. She used to get hit on quite frequently around class, especially by the linebackers.

 

[Linda_D]

I attended a Big Eight (then, now Big Twelve) university for graduate school nearly 40 years ago. I would say that all the bad things you've heard about big time college athletics probably occurred at one time or another at this school.

What's really sad is that their recruitment efforts seemed to focus on poor black kids from inner cities and ignorant white kids from farms/small towns. I thought it was a very exploitive system in which these young men were promised a college education but seldom got it because too much of their time was spent in the training rooms, on the practice field, and at games. Many simply weren't equiped for college, and when they ran out of eligibility or got on academic probation, they were dropped from the team.

I don't follow NCAA football because of my experience there.

 

[Bubba]

My undergrad alma mater is a small D-III school (no athletic scholarships) - all the athletes were good students.

My father taught history for 30+ years at a mid-sized D-II university with a fairly good football program. No one skated through his classes...in fact I can only recall him ever talking about one student athelete he had a problem with (the kid kept missing class - my dad had a chat with his position coach and the absences stopped).

A cousin my mine was a four-year starter and All-American (football) during the '80s at a major southern D-I school. He's admittedly not the brightest guy in the world, but he did manage to stay academically eligible for four years...somehow.

 

[Hink]

I was a collegiate athlete, so I guess I have a somewhat different perspective. I will not say that some athletes aren't coddled. They are. They are given every opportunity to succeed. Some still fail. This is mainly due to the fact that they believe they are entitled.

When you are the best at what you do in high school, you get to college and think that you will still be a star. Many are not, but they are treated as though they are better than some of the other students. Especially in academics, where many are not at the same level. I went to a DI school where our football team was one of the three worst in the country. They still felt they were entitled.

I don't believe that many athletes cheat to pass... I really don't. But with tutors, required study tables, and forced study time, you really have to try to fail. I would imagine that some even can take some "practice" questions from the actual test...

My team happened to have the highest GPA out of all the men's sports 3.75, which helped our overall men's programs because our number brought up the curve. But I wasn't a football or basketball player.

From my experience, and I was friends with many basketball and football and baseball guys (our baseball team had the first pick in the draft one of the years I was there), it is really dependent on the kid. Did he go to college to get an education and was thankful that he could do it for free... or did he only go to college because he could play a sport, and would "get through" the academic part?

The problem is with the system. College is about academics. We shouldn't be propping up athletic teams with academics budgets. Football is the primary culprit of this brain and financial drain. We just can't imagine a college campus without a football team... so we let kids slide by without actually getting a true education. Sad.

 

[WSU MUP Student]

I never had a class with an athlete of note but my wife had multiple math classes classes with Tom Brady and he also headed up a math study group that she was in her sophomore year. She says he was easily one of the nicest athletes she ever met there. She lived in a dorm that had a lot of the football players in it and she says that the majority of them were pretty nice guys but there were always two or three guys that were loud and obnoxious and arrogant and gave everybody else a bad reputation by association.

I have a friend from grad school who had a class with Michael Phelps at the University of Michigan during undergrad. She claims he showed up maybe once or twice and she saw him at the bar much more often than at class. She also claims that he was the biggest pig of a guy she had ever met and was not real nice to the ladies.

 

[kjel]

The problem is with the system. College is about academics. We shouldn't be propping up athletic teams with academics budgets. Football is the primary culprit of this brain and financial drain. We just can't imagine a college campus without a football team... so we let kids slide by without actually getting a true education. Sad.

Rutgers should be the poster child for this sort of chicanery....

2006-the university gave $5.8 million in athletic scholarships and had a budget of $35.5 million.
2007-the university citing reductions in state funding cuts 6 sports, men's heavy and light crew, men's and women's fencing, men's diving, men's swimming, and men's tennis. 153 athletes participated on these teams. Estimated savings is $2 million. Curiously the budget increases to $49 million and scholarships to $6.2 million. Most of the budget increase goes to football and the scholarships to other women's sports.
2008-The athletic budget increased to $52 million and scholarships to $6.9 million. About 1/3 of the scholarship funds are earmarked for football.
2009-the state and the university approve an expansion of the football stadium to the tune of $102 million. According to the press statement "The project will be funded entirely by revenue generated by the success of the athletics program – including ticket sales for the approximately 12,500 new seats as well as parking fees, concession sales and donations from season ticket holders." Guess what didn't happen!
2010-the university is now trying to get into the Big Ten conference to get a slice of a bigger pie than the Big East conference offers.

Bottom line is the university has seen unprecedented tuition and fee hikes over the past 4 years that I have been here not to mention increasing class sizes and unfilled academic positions. It is now cheaper for my daughter to attend a public university in NYC with out of state tuition than to attend Rutgers with in state tuition. All because of football. As the uni president said in a news conference "You can't unring a bell that's already been rung" in response to the unrelenting push to build a better football program.

 

[Dave F]

I attended a Division III school (research intensive university in upstate NY) that had a very good men's basketball team, generally strong women's "olympic" sports and mediocre football and baseball teams. Despite being a D-III school, meaning there were no scholarships, the football and baseball players often were a noticeable cut below the rest of the student body in terms of preparation and aptitude. These players tended to cluster in the one or two easier majors the school offered and still did not get very good grades. Since this school was definitely regarded as an academics-first institution, the presence of this group of atheletes who underarchieved on the field (with no chance of going pro after college) while selling themselves short in the classroom made the rest of the students wonder "WTF?"