The Way Forward Comment Count

Brian

schlisselatsacua[1]

unguarded remarks

Our latest thing/apology cycle comes courtesy of the president, who told a large faculty meeting that he didn't really get it when it came to sports.

"We admit students who aren’t as qualified, and it’s probably the kids that we admit that can’t honestly, even with lots of help, do the amount of work and the quality of work it takes to make progression from year to year,” he said. “These past two years have gotten better, but before that, the graduation rates were terrible, with football somewhere in the 50s and 60s when our total six-year rate at the University is somewhere near 90 percent, so that’s a challenge.”

Schlissel said an individual’s academic deficiencies are often overlooked to fill competitive rosters.

And that's fine. It's fine that he said it, fine that people reacted to it, and fine that the next day the university issued the lawyered-up CYA statements that large organizations always do when someone does something remotely controversial.

The main disconnect here is the opposite of the "muggles" thing. Muggles supposes that student-athletes are a breed apart when I guarantee 99% of them would self-destruct in EECS 100, let alone that f-ing networks class. That's fine. Guys like that one hockey player in my EECS 380 are true marvels. That kind of dude is not nor should be required for universities to feel good about their big ol' sports programs.

Sports are a valid pursuit for someone in college. They are hard as hell.

College sport is a weird enterprise where people are admitted to a University because they have a particular skill, are expected to hone that skill upwards of 40 hours a week, and also get a meaningful degree in something totally unrelated. I do not think I would have done well at football practice after yet another f-ing night spent trying to convince the automated grader that I had in fact replicated TCP/IP precisely.

We have a model for this: music. Applicants to Michigan's School of Music have to submit a headshot, a resume, a "repertoire list", and submit to an audition. Also this:

Pre-screening recordings, portfolio, video interview, studio teacher preference, and/or writing samples required by your Department

SAT scores are not really that important. Music gets lumped in as an acceptable academic pursuit; sports do not. Music people get to go music and then get a liberal arts degree around it; sports for credit is ludicrous.

Why? Tradition and momentum. Sports started out as an extracurricular thing and the history of the NCAA has been a futile attempt to keep it from moving to its rightful place. I mean, scholarships used to be controversial.

The unfortunate thing is that football's towering media profile blots out the various other extracurricular-type activities that fulfill the same purpose. Poke a newspaper sports section in this country and you will find Daily grads crawling all over its staff. When I was in school some friends and I started the Every Three Weekly, and contemporary alums from that include this guy who writes movies and this lady who writes for Modern Family. They did not get their jobs by having a shiny GPA.

There are a number of professions out there in which chops are everything. These often follow models that boil down to "show me." Football is one of these things, along with any creative pursuit you care to name. A degree in it is a valid idea, and erases a bunch of the supposed hypocrisy that comes along with the model. You know, the stuff that causes some yob at the WSJ to lead off with this:

Who believes in the myth of big-time college sports anymore? The polite fantasy of the student-athlete playing gratefully for pride and tuition has been stripped away by an overwhelming financial reality that became too big and rich to ignore. The hypocrisies can be seen from outer space, and public opinion—not to mention the courts—are catching up.

The force of my eye-rolling threatens to detach my optic nerves. Over the past few years I have met many former players, and they are universally impressive. From Vincent Smith to Marlin Jackson to Brandon Williams to Todd Howard, all of these guys got out of the University of Michigan what they put into it: a ton. I bet some of them didn't pay too much attention to their grades because that is a reasonable thing to do when you are doing something as demanding as football. People do not have infinite reserves of energy, and their grades won't matter—even if they end up in something else. For history majors, GPA is a demonstration of effort. For athletes, that's assumed.

Universities would be better off saying "yes, this is weird but it is valid" instead of clutching their pearls. Michigan needs to take kids and prepare them for existence outside the university; in my experience they are terrific at this.

Let them graduate in their field, with a liberal arts distribution attached. Test them when they arrive and when they leave to make sure you're doing a good job of educating them. I'd much rather be affiliated with a university that takes kids with some academic questions and turns them into the guys I've met than one that snootily says "not you" because of things outside that kid's control.

Comments

Ron Utah

November 14th, 2014 at 12:10 AM ^

Well done, sir.

The NCAA (and school in general) has done itself a great disservice by disconnecting sports from education.  While sports are rightly differentiated from academics, they are certainly a valid, empowering component of education.

I've said it before and I'll say it again: I learned more on the field in college than I did in the classroom.  No, I'm not a professional athlete.  But I double-majored in International Relations and Theatre and I don't do those either.

"Student-athlete" is a stupid and redundant term.  Athletes are students--even the pros have to be constantly learning and honing their craft.  And athletics are part of education, just as surely as law, business, or medicine.

That we view sport as an entirely different class of education is societal mistake; while I would never argue that football = English literature, I would be just as foolish to argue that philosophy = engineering.

There is no doubt to anyone who has ever been a serious college athlete (I'd like to think I'm in that category) that the field and the classroom are complimentary, not competitive.  Yes, they are different disciplines, but they are both part of education, and I believe they are both indespensible to a complete education.

My kids will play sports.  Whether they like it or not, whether they excel at them or not, they will play, just like they will have math classes whether or not they like them or excel in them.  I believe educating mind, body, and character helps us grow into more complete human beings, and sports can do all three in a unique way.  When coupled with the rigors of classroom learning, I believe athletics help create a comprehensive foundation for effective, lifelong thinking and decision-making.

And it's worth saying again: This was an awesome post, Brian.  Thank you.

bluins

November 14th, 2014 at 2:09 AM ^

I think an appropriate analogy is Solar Car - although it is tangentially related to an Engineering degree, while footbaw doesn't have an academic corrolary. 

 

I had a roommate working on Solar Car and he probably spent more time in that garage than any football player did on South Campus. I believe he even took a semester off when they went to Australia to race it. It was a huge time commitment and I know it hurt his grades, but I'm sure it has paid off for him.

MayOhioEatTurds

November 13th, 2014 at 4:06 PM ^

Tremendous post. 

The music school metaphor is one of the best arguments I've seen on this topic.  It clearly illustrates the double standard academics insist upon.   

The great thing about the music school argument is that people from the music school don't dispute it, either.  (I studied classical piano under Prof. Collier at UofM [albeit via private lessons]).  They don't pretend to operate under the hard-sciences model; they recognize musical performance is the best, the only omen. 

It's time for pointy-headed academics--many of whom, in my experience, grew up playing an instrument but not sports--to recognize that athletics is a valid, too.  Perhaps they are still smarting from being last-picked on the dodgeball squad. 

Jock-envy:  It makes glib hypocrisy easy. 

hopkinsdrums

November 13th, 2014 at 5:23 PM ^

There are more majors within the music school that are not performance-related.

Music Education.

Composition.

Musicology.

Conducting.

Every single Masters and Doctoral program, which are almost entirely academic.

These are all academic pursuits within music that are augmented BY performance, not subordinate to performance.

I am a double major in performance and music education, and I can assure you I have a very rigorous academic plate before me. I wish I had more time to perform and practice. Instead I'm studying the history of jazz, or the theories present in the music of Bach, or how to better understand the needs of special needs students in a music classroom.

Certainly, there are musicians within the school who are trying to be performers, and who value performance over all else. But even they all took a LOT of academic classes, even if said academic class was related to music. 



I think this metaphor was a solid attempt, but not as informed and equivalent as it is being made out to be.

MayOhioEatTurds

November 13th, 2014 at 5:38 PM ^

You miss the point entirely:  Music performance alone is all one needs to make the double standard argument. 

Surely you aren't suggesting that the School of Music has no performance major?  Or that it doesn't matter because the School of Music offers other majors as well?

Your argument is in ruins.  But don't misunderstand:  No one doubts the academic rigors of your music education degree.  Nor is anyone trying to start an academic genitalia-measuring contest.  Quite the opposite, in fact:  We're saying such contests should be done away, and that the music performance major alone is proof of this fact. 

 

Baloo

November 13th, 2014 at 8:04 PM ^

The School of Music's performance major requires 30 credits of coursework outside of the music school as well as many academic courses within the school including two years of musicology, two years of music theory, and a minimum number of music history credits.  The performance part, as you must be aware, is only 5-6 credits of the total schedule.  In addition, the act of performing music itself involves extremely complicated mental exercises, which is one of the reasons studying music tends to boost test scores in other subjects like math and science.  Finally, all students receiving merit-based music scholarships must maintain a GPA of at least 3.2 or they lose the scholarship.

In short, the comparison to athletics from an academic standpoint is ridiculous, which should be immediately obvious to anyone who has actually completed the performance major.

gasbro

November 13th, 2014 at 8:39 PM ^

It's this part that drives home the point:

"The performance part ... is ... 5-6 credits of the ... schedule."

 

I don't think he was advocating that they shouldn't take any classes and just play football. But, I agree it is very reasonable to give them some credits for playing football given the work put in that undoubtedly teaches them skills to be successful in many future pursuits.

Baloo

November 13th, 2014 at 9:03 PM ^

There are many things in life that teach you useful skills.  That doesn't mean you should get credit for them at one of the nation's best public univerisities.  Running, blocking, and throwing are not valid academic pursuits, and treating them as such would undermine everything U of M stands for.

bjk

November 13th, 2014 at 10:53 PM ^

that the non-performance element in a liberal arts degree in music performance is the strong point of Brian's argument.

The music major is itself a creation of a conflicted history amalgamating the conservatory tradition of Napoleanic France, a sort of straight-up vocational skills training for a sort of laboring class of performing musicians, the musicology discipline out of the German philosophical/university tradition and the egalitarian/mass-access ideal of the great American land-grant university tradition.

It has created its share of headaches for deans of liberal arts schools down through the years as they tried to apply the increasingly corporate-minded management mentality of maximizing yield from contact hours and other metrics to a field in which much of the actual teaching is done on a one-on-one basis. It has fared badly in the modern era as expectations for the academic side of music -- history and literature, theory and harmony, methods, orchestration, keyboard harmony, score-reading, etc. -- as well as performance expectations are watered down in order to conform better with the delivery model of majors that fair better in a mass-access university system.

Clearly football has its own tortured NCAA history to overcome. But the model -- the coach awarding a grade for the 40 hours/week spent on football as maybe 30-40 semester-hours of a 120-hour major as that work is drastically understated in order to give the student/athlete generous access to secondary course material in order to put him/her on a solid post-graduate footing -- is valid.

Another music-school tradition worthy of importation to the field of football:

Let scholarship students pull in as much money as they want from outside work while working their way through school. Booker T Jones recorded the deathless Born under a Bad Sign sessions with Albert King flying to Memphis on weekends while simultaneously acquiring a degree in trombone performance at the vaunted music school at Indian University.

MayOhioEatTurds

November 13th, 2014 at 9:08 PM ^

Sir, you are obviously not "one who has actually completed the performance major." 

Contrary to your assertions, the "performance part" is absolutely the focus of this major.  I'm not sure what you mean by "the performance part . . . is only 5-6 credits of the total schedule," but even a glance at School of Music performance curriculum shows your error: 

http://www.music.umich.edu/departments/strings/bm_curr_a.htm

Students in the performance major have to take private lessons in their major instrument every single semester, as well as participation in university orchestras every semester, as well as string quartet multiple semesters, as well as recitals--Sir, performance is the bulk of what music performance majors do! 

All of the foregoing performance is only made possible by hours upon hours of practice.  Not unlike what is expected of athletes. 

I'm not sure why you're so amazed that music performance majors have to take 30 hours of credits outside the School of Music.  I'm sorry, but every major has to take 30 credit hours of general electives!  Thank goodness musicians are required to take English 124 or 125 or equivalent.  Why, even members of the football team have to satisfy G.E. requirements, whatever their major.  

The comparison of athletics to music performance remains sound.  I'm not sure why it's hard to remember that athletes are doing coursework outside of football, just like musicians do some coursework outside the practice rooms.  The only difference is athletes don't get a degree for athletic performance, like musicians get for musical performance. 

Baloo

November 13th, 2014 at 9:27 PM ^

There is not a single thing in your link that contradicts my post.  

What I meant by my 5-6 hours comment is exactly what I said - the performance element of the major represents only 5-6 (at the most) of the total schedule.  My last semester at the music school, my private lessons were two credits, and participation in the Univeristy Orchestra was two credits.  That's 4 out of 18 that were devoted to exclusively to performing music.  I honestly have no idea how your post is supposed to be a rebuttal.

ChasingRabbits

November 14th, 2014 at 9:56 AM ^

Serious question. 

If your music performances graded out at C level, but you kicked ass in your English (and other LSA type courses) what would happen to your standing in the Music School?

If you Kicked ass in your music performances, but your LSA type stuff graded out in the C range, what would happen?

My personal feeling is that is someone brings something to the table that raises the profile of the university (whether everyone agrees that it is an academic pursuit or not) then as long as they complete their coursework at an average clip, then the University is better off for having them enrolled.  This would go for Athletics or Music or Art or any other skill one might have. 

 

 

 

 

 

hopkinsdrums

November 14th, 2014 at 11:54 AM ^

Even the pursuit of performance itself is beyond just a physically executive act. Consider a jazz major, for example, who spontaneously improvises (yes, there is a jazz studies degree at U of M). Even in the midst of performance, the jazz major must have total intellectual and social awareness in order to perform within the context of an improvised music group. And sure, you may make the argument that a lineman needs to be cognizant of who to block, pass vs. run, what yardline he's on...but come on man. Apples to oranges. It's a completely different pursuit to be a performing musician, involving all parts of the brain, backed by extensive research which you obviously haven't read (though, if you want to read some, I'd be willing to point you in the right direction; music education majors have to be immersed in said research).

In reply to by You Only Live Twice

MayOhioEatTurds

November 13th, 2014 at 9:13 PM ^

I am a pointy-headed academic.  It's what I do for a living.  I'm a professor.  I teach at the Univeristy of Utah.  I went to school at the University of Michigan. 

This PC thing has gotten out of hand:  You can't even take a jab at yourself or at your own profession without some jackass jumping into the breach and feigning offense on behalf of others. 

 

You Only Live Twice

November 13th, 2014 at 10:29 PM ^

So it's just PC, Turds?  I don't care about being PC.  What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas.

And did you take a jab, at yourself?  Cause I didn't detect that level of humbleness.  Certainly my apologies for misunderstanding you.  It's not easy being so misunderstood.

And I'm a jackass?  What does that make you, Professor?  I've never met one yet that had to resort to name calling to make his or her point.  I know quite a few professors.  I'm a direct descendant of one from a UM graduate school.  Of the dozens of professors that I've known over the years, not one of them communicates the way you do.

Finally, the straw man.  I'm feigning what?   Offense?  There is no feigning, and there is no offense, merely another point of view offered, which, at your level of professorship I guess is unheard of.  You keep going on educating today's students and tomorrow's leaders.

You Only Live Twice

November 13th, 2014 at 10:30 PM ^

So it's just PC, Turds?  I don't care about being PC.  What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas.

And did you take a jab, at yourself?  Cause I didn't detect that level of humbleness.  Certainly my apologies for misunderstanding you.  It's not easy being so misunderstood.

And I'm a jackass?  What does that make you, Professor?  I've never met one yet that had to resort to name calling to make his or her point.  I know quite a few professors.  I'm a direct descendant of one from a UM graduate school.  Of the dozens of professors that I've known over the years, not one of them communicates the way you do.

Finally, the straw man.  I'm feigning what?   Offense?  There is no feigning, and there is no offense, merely another point of view offered, which, at your level of professorship I guess is unheard of.  You keep going on educating today's students and tomorrow's leaders.

You Only Live Twice

November 13th, 2014 at 10:30 PM ^

So it's just PC, Turds?  I don't care about being PC.  What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas.

And did you take a jab, at yourself?  Cause I didn't detect that level of humbleness.  Certainly my apologies for misunderstanding you.  It's not easy being so misunderstood.

And I'm a jackass?  What does that make you, Professor?  I've never met one yet that had to resort to name calling to make his or her point.  I know quite a few professors.  I'm a direct descendant of one from a UM graduate school.  Of the dozens of professors that I've known over the years, not one of them communicates the way you do.

Finally, the straw man.  I'm feigning what?   Offense?  There is no feigning, and there is no offense, merely another point of view offered, which, at your level of professorship I guess is unheard of.  You keep going on educating today's students and tomorrow's leaders.

You Only Live Twice

November 13th, 2014 at 10:31 PM ^

So it's just PC, Turds?  I don't care about being PC.  What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas.

And did you take a jab, at yourself?  Cause I didn't detect that level of humbleness.  Certainly my apologies for misunderstanding you.  It's not easy being so misunderstood.

And I'm a jackass?  What does that make you, Professor?  I've never met one yet that had to resort to name calling to make his or her point.  I know quite a few professors.  I'm a direct descendant of one from a UM graduate school.  Of the dozens of professors that I've known over the years, not one of them communicates the way you do.

Finally, the straw man.  I'm feigning what?   Offense?  There is no feigning, and there is no offense, merely another point of view offered, which, at your level of professorship I guess is unheard of.  You keep going on educating today's students and tomorrow's leaders.

eschaton811ydau

November 13th, 2014 at 3:26 PM ^

offer athletes classes like "film study of the ball screen", "option routes", and "the tampa 2 defense".

 

i bet we'd have a lot more viable alums for the coaching searches. and players wouldn't have to spend 18 hours a day doing school and practice.

Prince Lover

November 13th, 2014 at 3:29 PM ^

And guarantee a player's scholarship for life. Let the "unqualified" students have as long as it takes to graduate. Put his theory that no matter how much help they get, they can't do it to the test.

aiglick

November 13th, 2014 at 3:43 PM ^

Not sure that perk should be reserved just for athletes. There may be other fields students are interested in pursuing early and getting a degree right away may impede them from trying that path. This should be a perk for athletes but should be extended to other members of the student body as well.

Higher education is at a cross roads. The cost is exorbitantly high for even well off families and progressive universities that make it easier not harder to earn advanced degrees are going to gain a competitive advantage.

Agreed let's truly be the leaders and best and get out in front of the change that is surely going to come not only for the sports sides of universities but the academic sides as well.

turd ferguson

November 13th, 2014 at 4:03 PM ^

I'm about the fifth person to say this, but this is excellent and I agree wholeheartedly.

There are real issues involved with college athletes and academics, but I think the actual issues and the imaginary issues get thrown around together.  

For example, I think the critique that too many athletes have soft majors or take easy courses is ridiculous.  Why should we expect kids with more modest academic credentials upon admission, and dozens of hours per week of additional responsibilities, to take the same courses and perform just as well as the broader student body (on average)?  Of course we shouldn't.  And why should we expect athletes and non-athletes to have the same interests?  I mean, maybe the reason that a lot of Michigan athletes study kinesiology is because that's closer than anything else to their interests, not just because it's easy.  I picked my major because it's what I identified with and liked to think, talk, and read about.

The bottom line question to me is how well these athletes do in life after they leave their universities, and whether they're getting the same kind of (or better) life trajectory bumps that their non-athlete peers get.  I don't have Brian's personal experience with former athletes, but my sense is that most former Michigan football players do very well even if they never sniff an NFL career.  And that's true even though most had low GPAs and SAT scores relative to the rest of the university.

And then there are actual issues.  Sham classes are a problem.  Telling a kid who wants to major in physics that he can't because needs to focus on basketball is a problem.  But I don't think people are nearly careful enough in defining what's a problem and how to assess whether it's happening.

animalfarm84

November 13th, 2014 at 4:55 PM ^

"The bottom line question to me is how well these athletes do in life after they leave their universities, and whether they're getting the same kind of (or better) life trajectory bumps that their non-athlete peers get."

Exactly.  What I don't want to see is an approach where winning at football trumps the future life prospects of the players.  We know the odds of succeding at football professionally are exceedingly low, but so long as the education the players receive prepares them to do well--in football or, more likely, otherwise--after they leave, then I'd consider that a successful program.  

 

You Only Live Twice

November 13th, 2014 at 9:14 PM ^

Your bottom line question is, how do they do in life as opposed to what their credentials were coming in?  That sounds great but how do admissions officers look into the future and say hey let's admit this student because they are going to go out and do great things 4 years from now even though they couldn't get into LSA otherwise? 

I'm not advocating that you make football players have a 3.8 GPA with AP classes and a 30 ACT composite to get in.  You simply won't get many good football players that way.  You would, however, get more music students in as most high school bands and orchestras are populated with high achieving students. 

The comparision to the music school does not hold water.  The admissions criteria for the "non-academic major" in music are not the same, nor are the requirements once admitted, and there is also no comparision in terms of what support that student can expect.  There's no special meal plan or free tutors for music majors, not to mention other perks.  Some of that is justifiable and distinguishable which is another reason why it's a damn apples to oranges comparision. 

I do agree that football can be, and should be, acknowledged to be carved out as its own exception to the general admittance pool; openly different yet with its own defined criteria.  You don't need a 4.0, but a 2.5 is OK.  Or whatever.  Once in school, have to complete a defined curriculum.  If it's heavy towards general studies or sports management, so be it. 

Then the student-athlete will be admitted with consideration for what he can provide to the football program, as well as a shot at obtaining a degree that will open doors together with his name and affiliations.  At the same time, no one will be drawing meaningless comparisions as to why he isn't staying up half the night doing physics problems or practicing for his next opera, just as no one asks why the ChemEng major isn't making his tackles or catching more long bombs.

 

turd ferguson

November 13th, 2014 at 11:56 PM ^

Well, I'll give you credit for interpreting my comments in a way that's more ridiculous than I would have thought possible.

I'm talking about how, in an abstract sense, we should approach the question of "Do colleges serve their student-athletes well?"  I'm not talking about hiring fortune-telling admissions officers.  I'll be more specific about that next time.

FatGuyTouchdown

November 13th, 2014 at 3:32 PM ^

I played mid-level division 3 football in the Midwest for four years, and I cant even tell you how time consuming that was. And that was with a main emphasis on school. Division 1 sports are hard as hell man.

ST3

November 13th, 2014 at 3:33 PM ^

I wrote the following to a friend a few days ago who doesn't think big-time athletics belongs in a university setting. Seems Brian and I are on the same wavelength...

...we are all given different gifts, talents, and abilities. Some are more academically inclined. Some are more athletically inclined, and some are more artistically inclined. The fact is, that all have a place at the University of Michigan. I spent many days riding the buses to North Campus with art and music students. Their "school" was very different from yours or mine, but it was the same school. I did, in fact, go to classes with basketball and football players, rare though that may have been. Are athletic abilities inherently inferior to academic or artistic gifts? The lessons we learn from sports - team work, importance of practice, studying, time management - are lessons that help us throughout life. Is instruction in a career path focused on law, medicine, business or engineering the only role for a university? What does that say about the student who enrolls in LS&A, studies the Humanities and graduates "unprepared" for the real world? The fact is that college is about more than developing skills for a career. It is a time for personal growth, discovery, and questioning. Why would we deny that opportunity to athletes just because they don't fit our pre-conceived notions of what a student should be? High Schools have gym classes and athletic teams. Why should this part of the educational experience be excluded from higher education?

Baloo

November 13th, 2014 at 9:44 PM ^

"Are athletic abilities inherently inferior to academic or artistic gifts?"

At one of the world's elite research universities, yes, they are. It would be an absolute mockery to give a student academic credit for learning how to move another human being or advancing a ball across a field.

go16blue

November 13th, 2014 at 10:57 PM ^

Oh please. But it's just fine to give a dance student academic credit for learning to move their body in a way that dance critics like? I get that it doesn't have the same cultural "high society" status, but outside of that what's the difference? And is that difference enough to justify sticking with the status quo of faux-student athletes? 

Baloo

November 14th, 2014 at 12:45 AM ^

I'm not surprsied that people trying to make this argument all seem to bring up dance.  It's literally the only major that is remotely close to sports in its lack of emphasis on traditional academic learning, and I could still easily argue that a dance major has far more academic components than football.

Erik_in_Dayton

November 13th, 2014 at 3:41 PM ^

There are a lot of reasons I like this blog.  But Brian's take on this issue is possibly the No. 1 reason (well, other than that this is a Michigan blog).

I knew a lot of (non-revenue) D1 athletes when I was an undergrad.  I learned quickly that they couldn't possibly have the same academic experience my non-athlete friends and I did, because they were at practice all the time.  I also saw, though, that they received quite a lot from the structure that came from being on a team.  This was something I, as a non-athlete, didn't have.  And for that reason I'm not sure my athlete friends' experiences were any less than mine.

The athletes I knew weren't the best students (nor the worst), but those who worked hard were apparently like Vincent Smith, et al. in that they certainly seemed to get a lot out of their time in school, time they apparently wouldn't have had without sports.  To put it another way, their lives were greatly improved by their time as scholarship athletes.  That has to be a good thing, and I'm against any attempts to erase it simply because athletes often are not academic superstars.  Improving lives is more impressive to me than taking highly-achieving kids and keeping them on the same path they were on before they attended college.

MGoATC

November 13th, 2014 at 3:35 PM ^

Wow, you have articulated what I have felt, and never been able to put in words. I can only hope Schlissel and other academic types can find there way. Bravo