OT - CNN Article on NCAA athletes academic standards
A very interesting article about the deficiencies in the education level and entrance requirements for major universities. The article published by CNN seemed to focus mainly on football and basketball players, but they requested information on all students from public universities "where open records laws apply."
Its a pretty lengthy article, but worthwhile. Here's a teaser:
"A CNN investigation found public universities across the country where many students in the basketball and football programs could read only up to an eighth-grade level."
http://www.cnn.com/2014/01/07/us/ncaa-athletes-reading-scores/index.html?hpt=hp_c3
January 7th, 2014 at 6:49 PM ^
Michigan hopes to have a response for us Jan. 8. I’ll update the CNN graphic when we get the information. http://t.co/5OdMbavVu0
— Sara Ganim (@sganim) January 7, 2014
P.S. Her twitter TL has some great anecdotes
January 7th, 2014 at 6:31 PM ^
by most accounts, are the only legitmate programs in regard to revenue sport athletes carrying their academic water. Considering all of the other incredible demands at Army/Navy/Air Force, it's all the more amazing that these squads are even remotely competitive.
January 7th, 2014 at 6:32 PM ^
ND, Northwestern and Stanford? I believe they all graduate more than 90% of their athletes.
Also, keep in mind that at big football schools like MIchigan the demands of the program do not lend themselves to high academic achievement. Jim Harbaugh took Michigan to task on this issue.
January 7th, 2014 at 6:38 PM ^
All three of those schools lower their standards to admit athletes - ND probably the most. They do have good graduation rates though, as you noted. How they manage to pull that off is an interesting question.
January 7th, 2014 at 8:39 PM ^
program has graduated engineers, business grads, and future doctors, one of whom blocked for Harbaugh. Demanding, yes, but I suspect that is the case anywhere. Harbaugh really didn't discuss achievement, he was complaining about students being steered into easy curriculums. He went on to use himself as an example. At the same time, the same university steered Stefan Humphries into engineering. He played football and played student. On his way to the NFL, Humphries picked up an NCAA Academic All-American award.
January 8th, 2014 at 9:01 AM ^
And it should be noted as well that the classes even available at the service academies do not include the "underwater basket weaving" types. The basic degree offered, at Air Force anyway, is a Bachelor of Science. That has a minimum requirement for technical classes and core engineering classes that include Aero, Mechanical, Astro, Computer, Civil and Thermo dynamics (affectionately called Thermo God-Dammit).
The other thing I'd say is that entrance for football players specifically is not lowered, but once they are in the school there is a lot of extra help that the money revenue sport athletes get in the way of tutors. I would guess that some answers to tests were provided, but I can't necessarily prove it. There was an honor code that we lived by and violating it was serious business...kicked out of school serious. However, I'd be a fool to think that it didn't happen on the sly.
One other option for football and basketball players was the Academy Prep School, or other prep schools. It was another year of SAT test prep and to give the students an exposure to the military. I was a proud graduate of the AFA Prep school where I was a swimming recruit. It worked and I went on to graduate from AF and had a successful career. So, these options work.
January 7th, 2014 at 6:25 PM ^
this is as much of an indictment of the elementary and high school educational system in this country as it is of the universities who admit these underqualified students. sad, really.
January 7th, 2014 at 7:05 PM ^
January 7th, 2014 at 10:01 PM ^
In a post criticizing how others speak.
January 7th, 2014 at 10:37 PM ^
any·more adverb \ˌe-nē-ˈmȯr\
: in the recent or present period of time
Full Definition of ANYMORE
1
: any longer
2
: at the present time : now
January 7th, 2014 at 11:04 PM ^
I hate it when facts get in the way of my feeling of superiority. And I also think that usage makes no sense at all (though I am, apparently, wrong).
January 7th, 2014 at 6:34 PM ^
I previously taught at inner city public school and the statistics cited in the article are unsuprising. The students I taught were an average 3rd/4th grade reading level as juniors and had single digits/low teens on the ACT. With so many NCAA atheletes, especially football and basketball, coming from impovershed inner cities, this is the type of student that is getting admitted. These kids meet the NCAA regulations mainly based on grade inflation in HS due to the schools fear of failure and trying to look good. I would be in favor of a manditory redshirt year where student-athetes learn how to be students before athletes if they fall in certain academic criteria. This way students that are academically capable can be eligable as freshmen, but those in need of help can shift their focus away from the field/court/pitch/pool/etc and towards their education
January 7th, 2014 at 7:09 PM ^
whatever happened to "Prop 48"? I think that used to be basically a rule - if you had academic achievement below certain threshholds you were essentially redshirted your freshman year under "Prop 48". If I recall correctly, Rumeal Robinson and Terry Mills were both "prop 48" athletes (and I feel like they were either the first year it applied, or the first in Michigan's bball program)??
found an O-L-D Mitch Albom article about this...
January 7th, 2014 at 7:13 PM ^
For years, Michigan used a summer program (I think it was called something like the Bridge Program) to acclimate lesser-qualified freshman athletes to college work, enrolling them in (IIRC) both Spring and Summer semesters for various kinds of remedial work. I think it somehow got lumped into the general student body one later on, but there were always a lot of football and basketball players hanging around in the summer going to these classes.
January 7th, 2014 at 7:49 PM ^
Still going on, as far as I know. At least I knew of the bridge math class being taught as recently as last year.
January 8th, 2014 at 1:56 PM ^
Prop 48 (and its replacement, Prop 16) no longer exists. An athlete can't be admitted if he isn't fully qualified. Curiously, you almost never hear of star athletes not qualifying these days, whereas in the era of Prop 48/16 it was quite common. I suspect an increase in academic fraud at the HS level.
January 7th, 2014 at 8:59 PM ^
You need a smarter phone, that one made an awful lot of errors.
January 7th, 2014 at 7:01 PM ^
January 7th, 2014 at 7:05 PM ^
It's the same old story. For all the changes in rules through the years, there still are plenty of college athletes somehow making it through supposed college level courses who would probably struggle through most remedial courses if they weren't helped along just to stay elibible. A few weeks back I heard former Oklahoma State Fooball Coach Pat Jones quip on a local sports radio station here in Oklahoma that if there had been online classes back in his day, he could have gotten Dexter Manley a Master's degree but then added, "hell, we could've gotten him a Ph.D!"
(For those too young to remember who Dexter Manley is, he finally came to terms with his illiteracy and learned to read late in life, well after his 4 years of college and time in the NFL http://articles.baltimoresun.com/1992-10-08/sports/1992282145_1_dexter-reading-the-menu-ottawa-sun.)
January 7th, 2014 at 7:16 PM ^
January 7th, 2014 at 7:37 PM ^
* That's not why about 70 of them are there.
30 or so delusional or aspirational football players. 20 or so "sure thing" football players. 7 basketball players. 10 hockey players. A few baseball players and some olympic athletes. Everyone else is there for the education as well as the athletic experience.
January 7th, 2014 at 7:39 PM ^
Uhh... no. There are plenty of athletes here in non-revenue sports that don't care about the education at all. Sorry, only evidence I have to appeal to here is (extensive) personal experience.
January 7th, 2014 at 7:53 PM ^
What does "don't care" mean? I knew plenty of non-athletes that "didn't care."
So, your point is fair enough.
I was referring to the likely numbers that could expect to play their sport professionally. I guess implied in your point is that some people aren't realistic about that prospect.
Remember that the majority of student-athletes are not on full scholarship, so the education is a part of it even if they don't act like it. At least it is to mom and dad.
January 7th, 2014 at 7:58 PM ^
January 8th, 2014 at 1:58 PM ^
There are probably a lot more than 30 football players at U-M who think they can someday make the NFL. I would imagine that almost everyone who accepts a scholarship offer here is going to think that coming out of high school. The question is whether we can convince them all to stay focused on their schoolwork as well, because by the time they're seniors, a lot of them see the writing on the wall regarding football.
January 7th, 2014 at 9:37 PM ^
I wonder what would happen if student atheletes on scholarship were required to be within the 15th precentile in terms of SAT/ACT scores and/or GPA.
January 8th, 2014 at 8:25 AM ^
I thought Dexter Manley was the only one that couldn't read or write.