http://michigandaily.com/opinion/11daily-moving-forward-together21
From the Daily: A united approach
BY THE MICHIGAN DAILY
Published November 20, 2014
With the recent statements of University President Mark Schlissel, a national conversation has been sparked surrounding the balance of athletics and academics at the college level. The Michigan Daily Editorial Board has identified some of the ways in which this dilemma negatively affects college students. This editorial is part two of a two-part series, and focuses on how universities can address this problem.
A common narrative of late surrounds the separation of athletics and academics at the University. President Mark Schlissel has accurately pointed out that “Athletics isn’t part of the mission statement of the University.” However, an attitude of disregard perpetuates a culture that allows the impact of the Athletic Department’s demands on student-athletes to go unchecked. It has been previously documented that successful collegiate athletic programs contribute many academic benefits to their associated universities, indicating that academics and athletics are not independent. Unfortunately, this reality creates incentives for the exploitation of student-athletes. The University is poised to upset this status quo and fix it with careful hiring of a new athletic director.
Regardless of the lengths universities go to separate athletics from their academic principles, the two are deeply intertwined. Collegiate athletics provide universities with perhaps their most prominent and far-reaching advertising platform. The NCAA’s staggering television contracts highlight the value the nation places on collegiate sports, and this attention inevitably increases for universities with successful teams. The intimacy of the relationship between college academics and athletics cannot be denied; it has even been quantified in a study by Dong Chung, Harvard Business School assistant professor of business administration. His paper, “The Dynamic Advertising Effect of Collegiate Athletics” outlines that “when a school goes from being ‘mediocre’ to being ‘great’ on the football field, applications increase by 17.7 percent.” The leading example of this trend took place in 1984 when Boston College’s Doug Flutie threw a last-second, game-winning Hail Mary touchdown to trump the University of Miami. The so-called Flutie Effect caused the school’s application pool to increase by 30 percent in two years. Furthermore, Chung has found that the sports-induced attention drew a 4.8-percent increase in the average SAT score of admitted students, confirming the influence athletic success has on students of all academic abilities. A boost in the academic standing of a university is associated with a rise in ranking and thus a rise in funding. These benefits explain why a university would encourage good athletic performance. To deny the positive impact successful athletics has on our university would be unrealistic and irresponsible.
Unfortunately, it seems that academics are often sacrificed for athletic performance. Earlier this year, CNN filed open records requests at 37 universities and found that 7 to 18 percent of revenue sport athletes players performed at elementary school reading levels as indicated by admissions exams such as the SAT and ACT. If these students cannot keep up with the rigorous curriculum of the universities, it is at the fault of the school for placing unprepared students in a no-win situation.
The University of North Carolina’s solution to the issue of admitting underprepared athletes has been the most widely publicized. An independent investigator found that for about 18 years, UNC had its athletes take fake classes to inflate GPA to eligible levels. Some 3,100 student-athletes were found to be involved in the scandal. In 2009, similar athletic fraud occurred at Florida State University, involving 60 student-athletes.
In 2008, the Ann Arbor News released a four-part series highlighting the University of Michigan’s questionable practices, including pressuring student-athletes into certain majors. The report said, based on a 2007 audit, counselors even used athletes’ own login credentials to alter their schedules. In 2009, the University was found to violate the NCAA’s practice time limits — limiting the amount of time student-athletes had to devote to academics — and was placed on probation for three years.
Many universities have removed the emphasis on “student” from student-athlete. If student-athletes are supposed to receive a top-tier education in exchange for the revenue they bring universities, it has been found that they are too often cheated out of this compensation by pressure from counselors and demands from coaches. This culture continues because of a lack of leadership from the NCAA and a universal cowardice from schools that has led to a textbook prisoner’s dilemma. As Schlissel stated, enforcing the NCAA limit on practice and workout hours would be ideal, but doing so would be “ridiculous” if other universities don’t follow suit. Enforcing the standards may lead to diminished athletic performance, and no university will act without the guarantee that all others will begin to comply as well.
But there is hope. The Big Ten conference has provided a blueprint to solving the athletics-academics paradox with a unified approach that eliminates the cost of being the first and only school to prioritize academics. This year the Big Ten conference passed a resolution that guarantees scholarships to athletes of all its member colleges for the entirety of their academic careers. Given they are in good standing with the institution, this would no longer allow academic opportunity to be contingent on athletic performance and health. The Pac-12 has passed a similar reform. These guarantees are monumental steps in securing the educational compensation athletes are entitled to.
Still, more needs to be done. It is unacceptable that, as Schlissel pointed out, nobody obeys the NCAA cap on practice hours. The University of Michigan is in a unique position to deal with these controversies: the athletic director is currently undetermined. There is an opportunity to hire a director who is dedicated to protecting and providing for the student-athletes as they deserve; one who is willing to spearhead reform and reach out to other universities to band together — as the Big Ten and Pac Twelve conferences have — to improve the welfare of our student-athletes.
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'eggo denoted me a First ballot Hall of Famer!
- sandyeggo_blue wrote:
- that's some first ballot hall of fame stalking on your part. How in the world did you find that guy. I guess the better question is why?
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